


Goddess/Girlfriend

by UnmovingGreatLibrary



Category: Touhou Project
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/F, Gen, Slice of Life, Worship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-31
Updated: 2014-05-31
Packaged: 2018-01-27 16:15:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1716821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnmovingGreatLibrary/pseuds/UnmovingGreatLibrary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the unknown kami of the Hakurei shrine vanishes, Reimu's only option is to find a replacement, and fast. Sanae is an easy enough choice, but as Reimu adjusts to living with her former rival, she learns that the lines between friendship, worship, and love can be a little hazy...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Replacement/Moving Day

"Spirit Sign: Fantasy Seal!"

The two fairies in front of Reimu cringed and scrambled for cover, leaving a trail of stolen apples behind them. With a practiced flick of her wrist, she spread the stack of ofuda in her fingers and sent them shooting toward the pair.

... and barely two meters from her fingers, the ofuda suddenly drifted under the influence of air resistance, then gently fluttered toward the ground. Before they even touched down, the yin-yang orb remembered the laws of physics and abruptly stopped hovering. It thudded to the ground behind her.

An uncomfortable silence filled the air. Reimu stared at the failed attack in disbelief, then started patting herself down to find more ofuda. She could feel the fairies' eyes on her as she frantically tried to remember if she'd brought more. She hadn't exactly expected to need more than one stack to take care of two fairies.

"Um," one of them said, looking uncertainly between the shrine maiden and the pile of paper in front of her. "Was that the spell card, or...?"

" _No_ , that wasn't the spell card!" Reimu drew another stack of ofuda from her sleeve, then held them in the air. "Spirit Sign," she announced, with extra gusto, as if that might remind the yin-yang orb that it was supposed to be enchanting her attacks. As it had rolled into a ditch along the side of the path, chances seemed slim. For almost the first time in her life, she couldn't feel any power flowing from the thing. But it was still worth a shot. "F-fantasy Seal!"

The ofuda barely even left her hands before air resistance stopped them this time. As if they were nothing more than ordinary paper, they drifted into a messy pile just in front of her feet.

That was not promising. Panicking, Reimu crouched down and picked up a fistful of them to fling again, until she realized that the fairies were cautiously backing away. When she'd chased the two halfway across Gensokyo and started this fight, it had just been about getting back the tree worth of apples that the two had stolen from behind the shrine. Now, now it was about pride. "G-get back here!"

One of the fairies stopped and looked at Reimu in confusion. "You're not shooting, though." Reimu tossed a handful of now-crumpled ofuda in her direction, and after watching yet another attack fall helplessly to the ground, the fairy beamed with sudden confidence. "Well, okay...!"

* * *

Reimu should have kept her mouth shut. It was the only thing on her mind as she trudged home.  
  
Fairies usually didn't do anything harsher than childish pranks, but finding themselves facing a suddenly-powerless Hakurei shrine maiden... they'd gotten a _lot_ of pranking in. She could feel the eyes of what seemed like half the population of the human village following her as she passed through it, and she couldn't blame them. She was half-soaked, part of her dress was still frozen, there were a few twigs still tangled in her hair, and while she wasn't sure, she suspected that she was going to find something drawn on her face as soon as she encountered a mirror.  
  
More upsetting was the fact that she had to carry the yin-yang orb. It'd been the source of all of her powers since she was old enough to fight, and now, suddenly, it didn't do a thing. She couldn't even get it to hover alongside her, so she had to carry it tucked in an elbow. It was heavy. Very, very heavy.  
  
It was a bad day, and when she finally opened the door to the shrine, she found herself looking at the only thing that could make it worse: Yukari Yakumo, reclined in front of the table and holding Reimu's teapot. The youkai eyed her with barely-concealed amusement as she filled herself a cup. “Well, Reimu, I must say, that's a new look for you.”  
  
“Ha.” Under the circumstances, Reimu couldn't muster the energy to try chasing Yukari off just yet. After tossing the orb in the corner with a heavy thud and wringing the last of the water out of her outfit, she slumped down at the table and grabbed the teapot, then poured a cup for herself.  
  
“Bad day, hm?”  
  
Reimu only answered in a grunt, and took a sip of tea. Or, given her current inelegant mood, a slurp. It managed to calm her down a little. She had to admit, Yukari brewed it better than she did.  
  
“Perhaps it has something to do with this.” With her free hand, Yukari casually slid an envelope across the table. Reimu didn't need to pick it up to read the words on the front: 'Letter of Resignation.' “It seems like your shrine's god has gotten fed up and left.”  
  
Reimu's tea was forgotten, and she ripped the envelope open. The letter inside was short, neatly written, and to the point: “I, the kami of the Hakurei shrine, hereby resign.”  
  
“This isn't exactly convincing. How do I know this isn't a fake...?”  
  
“Well, judging by your appearance, I might guess that you lost your powers today.”  
  
Reimu huffed and glared suspiciously at Yukari across the table, weighing the facts. It was true, her loss of power was hard to explain any other way. And even for Yukari, this would be excessive for a prank... “H-he can't just _quit_! How can the shrine's god just up and quit, when I've never even known who they are?!”  
  
“Maybe the fact that you never even figured out who they are is part of the reason they're leaving,” Yukari said, with careful neutrality. She took another sip of her tea. “And she's a she, by the way.”  
  
“I don't care.” Reimu dropped the letter to the table, mostly to help her resist the urge to shred it, and pushed herself to standing. “I'm going to go get her back.”  
  
“ _Are_ you, now?” Yukari allowed a bit of amusement to show in her voice now. “And how do you propose that a human, who now has no powers, is going to force a goddess to let herself be enshrined?”  
  
“Well, I... I can't just give up like that!”  
  
“Sit down, Reimu.”  
  
Reimu wasn't accustomed to taking orders from youkai, but under the circumstances, she didn't have any better plan. After a defiant pause, she knelt down again. At the very least, it was true that she had no idea where she'd even start looking for a rogue deity in this condition. “You had something to do with this, didn't you?”  
  
“Me?” Yukari raised an eyebrow and took a sip of her tea. “As funny as it would be to watch half of Gensokyo trying to get revenge on you at once...” Reimu winced at that image. “... the Hakurei shrine is important to the balance of Gensokyo. So, I've taken the liberty of putting together a list of qualified replacements.”  
  
“Of other kami?” Reimu frowned and leaned one elbow against the table. “I can't just... hire a new one, can I?”  
  
“I don't see why not. It's not unheard-of to enshrine a new one when the previous one leaves.” A small gap opened in the air in front of Yukari, and she daintily plucked a piece of paper from within, then looked over it. “For example, you could enshrine one of the Aki sisters.”  
  
Reimu rolled her eyes. “Too pacifist.”  
  
“Utsuho?”  
  
“... is she really a _god_?”  
  
“She's imbued with divinity, yes. With enough prayer and time...”  
  
Reimu shuddered. “No. She's already powerful enough. Keep going.”  
  
“Hina?”  
  
“Next.”  
  
“Lady Yagokoro?”  
  
“... is _she_ a god?”  
  
“For her, becoming a god would be a demotion. But she might do it in the name of stability.”  
  
“... no.”  
  
“You could transfer Suwako or Kanako here.”  
  
“Out of the question.”  
  
“Well, that settles it, then! There's only one option left.”  
  
Yukari turned the list around and slid it across the table. Reimu's eyes went wide as they settled onto the final name on it. “No. No. Absolutely not!”

* * *

"... are you serious?!"

"Yes," Reimu said wearily. _Unfortunately_ , she added to herself, but had just enough restraint to not say it out loud. "Yes, I'm serious. Gensokyo needs the Hakurei shrine, and the Hakurei shrine needs a kami, so..."

Across from her, Sanae glanced incredulously to Kanako and Suwako before her attention turned back to Reimu. "But why me?"

'Why Sanae?' had been the topic of a long, long discussion she'd had with Yukari the previous night. Reimu had been adamant on trying to track down the shrine's missing kami, but Yukari had held her ground. It was true, she wasn't in any condition to hunt down a rogue spirit right now. And that of the possible replacements, Sanae was the one that Reimu was... least uncomfortable with.

That didn't mean that she liked any of this. Walking up to the Moriya shrine, powerless and unable to fly, had felt like an act of surrender.

But now that she was here, she might as well follow through. "Some of your powers already come from worship, right? So Yukari thinks you could adjust to it pretty easily..."

"And, she's part-kami by inheritance!" Somehow, by the time Suwako finished speaking, she was standing, and viciously rumpled Sanae's hair with both hands.

"L-lady Suwako!" Sanae ducked down with a squeak, then brushed her hair back out with her fingers, pouting. It took a second for her attention to return to the conversation at hand. "I mean, um, it's true! Lady Suwako is my... ancestor." She glanced uncertainly back to the smaller kami. "But I never thought of it like that. Would it really be okay to just ask people to worship me?"

"Why not? It's how I did it, when I was human," Kanako said. She looked, to Reimu's eyes, entirely too pleased at this whole conversation. "And if the Hakurei shrine is so desperate that it's head-hunting talent from us—"

"I'm not _desperate_..." Reimu mumbled, but the goddess continued unabated.

"—then I say that you should seize the chance."

"Huh...?" Sanae looked to Kanako, surprised. "Really?"

"Really. It isn't every day that an opportunity like this comes along. I don't want to split any more faith with the Hakurei shrine than I have to, but having the barrier collapse would be worse in the long run. If we're going to be competing with another goddess either way, I'd prefer it to be one we can cooperate with.”

"I didn't come here so that you three could make some religious conspiracy," Reimu grumbled.

“Just think of it as building good relations with your neighbors.” The fact that Kanako was still grinning made the reassurance fall a bit flat, as far as Reimu was concerned.

"Uh-huh."

Sanae frowned. "... who will take care of this shrine while I'm gone, though?"

"Sanae," Kanako said gently. "Suwako and I have been doing this for a few millennia. I think that we can take care of ourselves for a few years."

"But it doesn't sound temporary..."

Next to Sanae, Suwako chuckled. "When you get to be my age, you'll realize that _everything_ is temporary." It came off as a glib joke, but... not for the first time, Reimu detected bitterness in the childish goddess' eyes, and found herself wondering just how old she was.

Sanae lapsed into thoughtful silence, and hesitantly, Reimu said, "Look, it's okay if you're not interested..." Already, she'd decided to ask Hina if Sanae passed on it, but she didn't relish her chances of getting donations if word got around that her shrine was home to a goddess of misfortune.

"No, um! I am! This is just a lot to consider, you know?" Sanae laughed to herself. "It's not really the kind of thing I ever thought about..."

"Mmh."

"Ahh, I understand. Scared we'd crush you, huh?" Kanako gave Sanae a hearty slap on the back. Reimu could almost hear the girl's bones rattling under the impact.

"Maybe a little..." Sanae absently fretted with a few strands of her hair, and the group fell into thoughtful silence. After a few minutes, Reimu realized that Sanae's eyes were focused on her, and she had just enough time to notice a growing grin on the girl's face before Sanae slammed a fist against the table and announced, "Y'know what? I'll do it!"

"You will...?"

"Yeah! I mean, what kind of loser would turn down a chance to become a goddess? Hehe. It's like the plot to a video game or something." Reimu frowned in confusion at this; Suwako and Kanako shot her looks of sympathy. Sanae, in her reckless enthusiasm, didn't seem to even notice. "Besides, I'm nearly an adult, right? It's about time I got my own place."

"It's not _your_ place, it's—nevermind. If you're sure, I guess..." Reimu looked between the three across the table from her. "So, um, how do we do this?"

Kanako still looked far too happy with this turn of events. "Well, enshrining a still-living human is usually not done in the outside world these days, even with an arahitogami like Sanae. You might need to fudge the process."

"I actually meant moving down to my place, for now. I mean..." Reimu glanced around the interior of the Moriya shrine. It was, she suddenly realized with growing jealousy, very full of _stuff_. Much more stuff than her own shrine. "You have things you want to bring down, right?"

"Oh! I should do that, yeah," Sanae agreed.

"Let us worry about that," Kanako said. "I can call in some favors."

"Well, okay. Is there anything else...?" This still felt far too easy to Reimu, but she wasn't about to complain. Easy was good, especially right now.

Sanae looked uncertainly between the two goddesses flanking her, and Kanako said, "A drink, to a long and fruitful relationship between our two shrines?"

Reimu perked up... for just a second, then wilted as she remembered. Right, she couldn't fly now. She'd need to walk all the way back down the mountain. The mountain, completely inhabited by youkai, and her without any powers. "I'd better not..."

Kanako nodded. "In that case, we can have Sanae ready to move within two days. Can you return then to pick her up?"

"Sure..."

"Then we will see you in two days, Reimu."

"Yeah!" Sanae leveled a finger imperiously at Reimu. "Don't be late to pick up your new goddess!"

Reimu sighed as she pushed herself to her feet. “... don't let it go to your head just yet, Sanae. I'll see you in two days.”

* * *

The two days passed at a crawl. With no ability to fly and no powers, there was nothing to do but lay around the shrine and hope that the youkai were well-behaved. It was an uneasy combination of boredom and anxiety—nothing to do, no easy way to visit people, and utterly aware that if trouble started, the only tools she had at her disposal were stern glares and the hope that news about her missing powers hadn't spread too far.

So, Reimu did what little she could to prepare the shrine for its new goddess. She cleaned. She emptied out a room. She read up on what few rituals she could find.

Trudging back up the mountain two days later, she was acutely aware of her lack of powers again. Youkai Mountain had earned its name for a reason, and even though the tengu patrols had long ago learned to give her a wide berth, she still imagined the eyes of tengu and kappa following her for the entire ascent. It was a good motivation to hurry, and she practically jogged up the mountain, with her breath leaving a foggy trail in the cool air behind her.

When she finally reached the Moriya shrine, Reimu wasn't sure what she was expecting to find. What she actually found, though, was an overloaded cart, 'TENGU SISTERS MOVING COMPANY' painted on the side, and the two apparent proprietors loading boxes into it while Sanae hovered over them busily. "P-please don't drop that, it's really fragile!" She sighed in exasperation, then perked up again when she noticed Reimu. "Oh! Good morning!"

"Morning..." Reimu eyed the cart. That was... definitely more stuff than she personally owned. "Is that really all yours?"

"Mmhm. I'm leaving some of my old clothes here for now, but..."

Kanako walked out of the shrine and dropped a cardboard box into Sanae's arms. "This is the last of it."

"Thanks." Sanae briefly inspected the box's contents, and after a nod of approval, handed it off to one of the movers. "All set, I think!"

"You'll be paid when the job is done," Kanako added.

After securing the last few boxes, the movers took off down the mountain, with the cart clattering behind them. Reimu watched it go uneasily. "A tengu moving company, really?"

"Tengu do good work," Kanako said. "And they know I'll never let them live it down if they break anything."

"I'd be more worried about them going through your things..."

"Ah, Gensokyo natives wouldn't know what half of it's for anyway." Suwako leapt from the pillar, and even though it was several meters tall, landed in a froglike crouch with practiced ease. She straightened up and brushed herself off, smiling to Sanae. "Are you ready to go, then?"

Sanae shifted her weight from foot to foot. "I... guess I am, huh?"

Kanako smirked. "Second thoughts already?"

"No, I've made up my mind," Sanae said. She pumped a fist in front of herself, then hesitantly relaxed it. "But, you know. Even with the move here, it will be the first time I've lived anywhere but the shrine since I was a kid..."

"You're finally moving out on your own. Maybe this makes you an adult."

"Yeah, maybe...!" Sanae conceded with a soft laugh.

Suwako tackled against her stomach in a hug. "Behave yourself down there!"

"I will!"  
  
“It's going to be a lot more boring without you around.”  
  
“I-I'm sorry, Lady Suwako.” Sanae's voice cracked. Reimu turned the other way and found a nice tree in the distance to study. She really wished they'd gotten this all out of the way before she'd arrived.

"Crying already?" Kanako said teasingly, as she reached over to ruffle Sanae's hair. "A goddess should show more composure. You're only moving a few kilometers away."

Sanae sniffled. "R-right..."

"Sanae?"

"Mmh?"

"Even if we're competitors now, we're proud of you."

Sanae broke down bawling. Behind her, Reimu could hear a complicated dance of hugs and pats on the back as the two comforted the girl. Only after several minutes, when it seemed a little quieter, did she dare to turn around and clear her throat. "All set, then...?"

In response, Kanako gave Sanae a one-handed shove toward Reimu, and the green-haired girl only barely managed to stumble to a stop short of crashing into her. "She's all yours." Reimu was surprised to see tears drying in the corners of Kanako's eyes, too.

"... thanks."

"Hey, you know!" Suwako said, tilting her hat back to look up at Reimu. "If you're looking for work, our shrine's short a miko now..."

"I'll keep it in mind," Reimu said, with a roll of her eyes. "Come on, let's go. This is going to be a long trip. Some of us still can't fly, you know."

* * *

Suwako shouted and waved until the two were out of earshot, after which the only sound was the trees rustling in the wind. Sanae seemed to have plenty on her mind, and Reimu was a bit thoughtful, herself. The whole scene with the three saying goodbye had left her strangely uncomfortable. Reimu had never _had_ much of a family. That kind of closeness was alien to her. She'd been living alone pretty much since she was old enough to take care of herself.  
  
Well. She supposed that was changing now. The idea of having somebody living with her still seemed like a weird one, but it wasn't like she could take it back now.  
  
The trip passed with only the most idle of small talk. When the Hakurei shrine finally came into view, they found Sanae's belongings already neatly stacked next to the door. After the long, long walk, it was all they could do to drag most of it inside before they collapsed.  
  
“We'll finish it tomorrow,” Reimu promised, as she flopped onto her back, with her head leaned against one of the boxes. Under the circumstances, it was a surprisingly comfortable position.  
  
Sanae laid down across a few boxes of clothes, making them bulge beneath her. “This kind of feels like a sleepover, doesn't it?”  
  
“I don't know, what's a sleepover?”  
  
“... it's an outside world thing, I guess.” Sanae lapsed into embarrassed silence. Outside, the first few crickets of the evening were starting to chirp.  
  
When the silence became unbearable, Reimu had no choice but to try drumming up more conversation. Unfortunately, the first thing that came to her mind was, “I didn't know that you and those two goddesses were... like that.”  
  
“They've been looking after me since I was four. They're basically my parents,” Sanae said, with a soft smile on her face.  
  
“Huh. Um. If you regret coming here, it's still not too late, you know...”  
  
“Nope! It'll take some getting used to, but... Lady Kanako was right. This is part of growing up. If we were still in the outside world, I'd be moving out for college or something soon, anyway.”  
  
“You seem pretty upbeat about the whole thing.”  
  
“Hehe. Why shouldn't I?” Sanae pulled her legs back, and in a single motion, roll-leapt from the box to land on her feet. In an instant, she was bent over Reimu curiously. “Doesn't it sound fun to you, being a goddess?”  
  
Reimu raised an eyebrow. “Should it?”  
  
“Well... yeah! You get to answer prayers, and make the world a better place.”  
  
“'Make the world a better place,' huh?” Reimu wasn't really used to thinking of kami in those terms. Beyond her now-absentee, unknown goddess of the shrine, she was used to thinking of them as... service providers. Make the right offering or perform the right ritual at the right time and, sure, they'd do something nice, but Reimu had always viewed it as more of an _exchange_ than an act of benevolence. But, still... “... that doesn't sound so bad.”  
  
“I know, right?” Sanae's enthusiasm was almost infectious, Reimu had to give her that. “So I'm pretty excited to get started.”  
  
“It's getting late. Maybe we could sleep first?”  
  
“Right, right! I guess we should.. But starting tomorrow, we'll make this the best damn shrine in Gensokyo.” Sanae offered a hand down to the still-prone Reimu. “Partners?”  
  
Reimu almost wanted to roll her eyes at that announcement, even if she _had_ made a few like it in short-lived fits of enthusiasm. She reached up and took Sanae's hand, though, and as Sanae hauled her to her feet, repeated, “Partners.”


	2. The Famicom Light Gun of Truth/The Ceremony

Reimu woke up the next morning to the sounds and smells of cooking coming from the shrine's tiny kitchen. A moment of confused panic set in, followed by the slow memory that, oh right, she didn't live alone anymore.

The shrine maiden reluctantly rolled out from under her warm covers and trudged into the kitchen, rubbing the sleep from her eyes with one hand. Sure enough, Sanae was standing in front of the stove, watching several dishes cook. Reimu leaned against the doorway for support, and when her brain caught up with the rest of the world, mumbled, "... the last goddess never made me breakfast..."

"Oh. Good morning!" Sanae looked back over her shoulder as she poked at a pot of rice. "Sorry to intrude on the kitchen. I'm just used to getting up early to make breakfast for the goddesses."

"... are you sure you were a shrine maiden and not a maid?"

"Honoring somebody can take a lot of forms. Lady Kanako just prefers the forms that involve somebody else making her coffee. She gets really cranky in the mornings until she gets it."

"That's not very... traditional."

"A forward-thinking faith for the twenty-first century! That's always been the Moriya Shrine goal!" Sanae lifted a spoon in the air proudly, with a few grains of rice still sticking to it, before remembering that she was no longer associated with the Moriya Shrine. "... we're going to need to be flexible if we want to beat them, you know."

Reimu yawned. "How about we have breakfast and unpack your stuff before we worry about beating anybody?"

* * *

Unpacking Sanae's stuff was easier said than done. Reimu quickly revised her earlier estimation: Sanae had _way_ more stuff than she did. Way too many things had wires, despite the fact that the Hakurei shrine didn't have electricity. Sanae sadly relegated half of her belongings to stay in boxes piled up in the corner ("Electricity! Our own power plant to compete with the fusion reactor! That's a good long-term goal!" Reimu sighed in response.) and the room somehow still ended up a bit cramped.

Once the last poster was tacked to the wall, the two walked back into the main room, and Sanae nimbly dropped to the floor to sit cross-legged. "So, how are we gonna do this?" Reimu wasn't sure how she had so much energy. After all of that work so early in the day, she was ready for a nap, herself.

"Do what?"

"The... worship thing."

"Oh." Reimu crossed her arms as she thought. "Well, we need to enshrine you here, first. And I guess you should have a goshintai."

"Oh. Hmm. I hadn't thought about that! ... any suggestions?"

"I guess it should kind of reflect who you are?" Reimu shifted her weight from foot to foot. She was making an uncomfortable amount of this up as she went; the few religious texts scattered around the shrine were written on the assumption that it would never _n_ _eed_ a new kami.

"Hmm. What else?"

"If it's something cool and mysterious, that would bring in a lot more donations. Oh, and..." Reimu glanced sidelong at the yin-yang orb. It was still resting in the corner that it had rolled to after she got home the other day. Try as she might, she couldn't coax the slightest bit of power out of it. It might make a good paperweight now, but it wasn't going to be much use to her otherwise. "... something that I can carry with me while youkai-hunting would be good."

"Hmm, portable... ah!" Sanae reached up and fussed with her hair until she was able to pull her frog hair clip free, then held it out. "It's the first thing anybody remembers about me! I got a lot of compliments on it back home."

"Frogs are that other girl's thing, though. We can't have _two_ shrines with weirdo frog-loving goddesses..."

"It's not weird," Sanae said, and pouted as she put the hair clip back on.

"Your gohei? It's not like you'll need to use it anymore..."

"No, that's too traditional! This shrine needs to be exciting if we're gonna win the hearts and minds of Gensokyo!"

Reimu rolled her eyes. "Your panties, then."

"... just what kind of worshipers are you trying to attract, here?"

The two sat in thoughtful silence for a few minutes, until Sanae suddenly jumped to her feet. "I've got it!"

"Huh...?"

Without answering, Sanae hurried into her room. Reimu could hear her digging through boxes. When she finally returned, she was carrying some kind of gray plastic thing with a cord. Reimu vaguely recognized the shape as being some kind of gun. "What the heck is that?"

"This," Sanae said proudly, "is an _original_ , like-new condition, Famicom light gun. Pretty cool, huh?"

Reimu was not impressed. "I understood about three of those words. What does that have to do w—" She trailed off as Sanae leveled the thing at her.

"Bang!" Sanae pulled the trigger, and while it didn't do anything but make a feeble click, Reimu still sprawled backward to get away from it.

"Very funny." Reimu straightened her clothes as she sat back up, looking progressively more annoyed. "But what does _t_ _hat_ have to do with anything?"

"This is how I made my legend in the outside world!"

"... what do you mean?"

"I'm _really_ good at Duck Hunt, okay? This thing got me _dates_."

"It's for hunting ducks?"

"Fake ducks. It's a game." Sanae tipped the gun back and blew pretend smoke from the end of the barrel. "But it's pretty cool, right? And probably kind of mysterious, if you're from Gensokyo. And! It's both old-fashioned and modern. Like the shrine should be! The, um, best of tradition and modernity or something, you know?"

"What's old-fashioned about _that_ thing?"

"They stopped making these things before I was born. This is practically an antique."

"Well, I guess it's pretty cool..." Reimu admitted.

"Exactly. And that's all that matters, right? It's something that will draw worshipers, and it's something that you can pack around pretty easily when you're fighting youkai. To, um, call on my powers or whatever."

Reimu reached out and grabbed the thing. "... nope, I don't feel any powers."

"It's not official yet. Give it some time! Anyway, what else do we need to do?"

Reimu frowned. She wasn't quite ready to drop the question of the goshintai, but she didn't really have a better solution than the... gun... thing. "... clothes. You need new clothes, otherwise people will think that you're just another shrine maiden."

"Hmm." Sanae looked down at her outfit. "I guess you're right. Does the shrine have a fund for that kind of stuff?" Reimu's blank stare was all the answer she needed. "... okay, we'll figure it out."

"And," Reimu finally said, "I have to perform a ritual to enshrine you."

"Maybe we could make it a big event, to announce the, um, change in leadership? I don't know if I count as much of a goddess if nobody notices..."

"Nobody ever comes up here except for flower viewing parties. And even if they do, it's a big mess to clean up..." But she had to agree, she probably needed to _try_ to get people to worship Sanae. If she was going to be drawing on her power for youkai-hunting, she definitely needed to try getting her some worship as soon as possible. "... but I'll see what I can do."

* * *

Over the years, Reimu had declared six separate trees, a toy arm, and a few interesting rocks as new goshintai for the shrine. And once, in a fit of audacity, the entire hill that the shrine was on top of. As a result, she'd learned a thing or two about drawing a crowd, and these ceremonies were practically the only times she ever got human visitors. Over the past few days, she'd used every trick she knew to coax them out.  
  
And now... Reimu peeked out the door of the shrine. There were actually twenty or so people milling around out there, with only a few disinterested youkai lingering around the edges of the crowd. It was the most humans she'd seen at the shrine in months, and it was still a few minutes until the start time. She really had to hope they didn't waste this chance.

 Might as well get to work. Reimu closed the door and took a breath to steady herself, then hurried across the shrine to knock on the door to Sanae's room. "Hey! It's about time to start!"

 There was a long pause before Sanae's voice came from within. "Right, right. Coming..." She sounded half-asleep.

 "... were you taking a nap?!"

 "Yeah, I was. I'll get dressed! You don't need me for a while, right?"

Reimu sighed. It had taken days to prepare for this moment, and it had been like this for most of them. Sanae spent most of her time shut in her room, and when she showed up at meals, she looked exhausted. Reimu had no idea what she was doing in there, but she supposed it was a goddess' right to do whatever she wanted in private.

 And she was going to have to start thinking of Sanae as a goddess if this was going to work.

 Oh well. It wasn't like she'd show up late to her own enshrining. After taking a deep breath to steady herself, Reimu opened the door and stepped outside.

* * *

Reimu had made most of the rituals she needed for this over the past few days, cribbing off of similar rituals, copying bits that sounded neat, and throwing in whatever twists she thought would impress the viewers.

She started by walking out of the shrine, carrying the goshintai—the Famicom Gun, Sanae had made her memorize—with as much reverence as she could give to the plastic toy. Sanae had insisted on cleaning it herself, and she'd done a good job. The thing gleamed.

Outside of the shrine, Reimu had set up a small altar. Very purposely, it was right behind the donation box. She sat the goshintai on top of it, and the ritual began. Three passes around it, sprinkling it with water to purify it. A few more passes, waving her gohei over it. A final brief prayer, beseeching Sanae to invest a portion of her divinity into the goshintai, making the shrine her home.

As the last few words of the prayer faded on the air, Reimu dared to look up and open her eyes for the first time since it had all started. She was surprised to find that only _a few_ members had gotten bored and left.

"Please join m-me in..." Reimu's voice was quavering. She'd never spoken in front of this many people before, now that she thought about it. With everything she'd done in her life, it seemed weird for public speaking to be the one that made her nervous, but hey. She cleared her throat and continued. "Please join me in welcoming Lady Sanae Kochiya as the kami of the Hakurei shrine."

A wave of weak applause went through the crowd, as Reimu gestured toward the shrine's doors... and nothing happened. "Um." Ten seconds passed. "... um." Mutters and soft laughter ran through the crowd. "... let me just check on her..." Reimu started walking toward the door.

... and tripped, as everything was suddenly cast into twilight. Above, the midday sun just barely shone around the edges of the moon—a total eclipse. The crowd's murmuring shifted to a higher pitch, along with a few yelps of surprise.

Reimu heard the door opening, but could see nothing. She groped her way to the wall of the shrine and pushed herself to standing, just in time to see the ground burst open mere feet in front of the door. Gouts of steam blasted into the air, and from deep, deep, deep in the rents in the Earth, the dull glow of molten rock shone, illuminating the courtyard again.

And standing between the newly-formed geysers: Sanae. Reimu had managed to call in some favors to get Alice to come make her an outfit at the last minute, but this was the first time that she'd seen her wearing it. The cloth was white, but iridescent. It sparkled with subtle rainbows everywhere it caught the light, making it look like Sanae had draped herself in a waterfall. The outfit flowed down her shoulders into a pair of flared sleeves. In the back, it extended down to a ruffled hem right at Sanae's knees; in the front, it parted to the sides and left her pudgy tummy bare. A sapphire skirt of the same material extended all the way to her ankles on the right side, but was cut at a sharp angle to end just above her knee on the left.  
  
In some ways, it wasn't very different from her shrine maiden outfit. But with the way the outfit caught the light, Reimu's eyes still couldn't help but follow every move she made.  
  
Sanae took another surprisingly graceful step forward, and a second pair of geysers erupted to her sides. The crowd stepped back in anticipation, and after one final step and a matching pair of fissures, she stopped and raised her head.

As Sanae faced the crowd, Reimu realized that this was it. This was the first time that Sanae would address somebody, not as Sanae-the-shrine-maiden or Sanae-the-regular-girl, but as Sanae-the-living-goddess. Whatever Sanae said next would probably be more important than the rest of the ritual combined.

Somehow, that didn't stop her first words from being, "Um, h-hiya!"

* * *

"Hiya? _Hiya_? That was the best you could do?" Reimu was still laughing. "After all of that buildup, 'hiya'?"

"I-I didn't have time to think it out, okay?!"

The last of the attendees had drifted away barely half an hour ago, a full hour after the eclipse had ended. By Reimu's estimation, the event had been a rousing success. A handful of people had stayed behind afterward, clamoring to ask Sanae questions until Reimu had finally hauled her indoors to preserve a _little_ mystery. It was the first time that most of them had seen a kami up close, she supposed. The only other time would be Kanako's occasional science project demonstration, and those didn't usually qualify as awe-inspiring. But more importantly...

"Two thousand, one hundred, seventy yen," Reimu announced, with a broad smile on her face. She'd been counting the pile of coins in front of herself almost since the two had come inside. "That's the most I've seen in the donation box in... ever! The light show probably helped."

"Hehe. Did you like it? I was afraid that it might have been a little flashy..."

"It was great!” It took actual effort on Reimu's behalf to look up from the pile of coins. Already, she was planning on where to spend it. “I would have appreciated some warning... Was that why you've been so tired?"

"Yeah. It takes a lot of time and energy to prepare a miracle that big."

"Well, I think it was worth it. People have been getting a lot more demanding ever since all those religious duels in the middle of the human village. Normally I have to work my butt off to get donations anymore. You're a natural at this."

"I guess..." Sanae blushed and glanced aside.

"... so do you feel like a goddess now?"  
  
"Hmm. I don't know. What does a goddess feel like?"

"... good point. I guess I could see if I can draw on a little power, but... people might still be coming to visit the toy gun—um, goshintai—tonight, so I'm not sure if I should move it."

"You don't need it! Why would you draw on my power through _that_ when you've got the real deal right here?"

"What do you...?" Reimu's question was cut off, as Sanae reached over and grabbed her hand in her own.

"W-well? Feel anything?"

"I don't know, hold on!" Reimu, had to take a moment to calm herself down, then closed her eyes and focused. She'd been using the yin-yang orb so long that it was practically as natural as walking. Trying to draw power from something else, and focusing on it so purposefully, felt odd. Slowly, though, she felt the distant tingle of power. Guided by her will, it trickled up her arm and suffused through her body, and only then did she allow herself to exhale.

When Reimu opened her eyes, she was flying. Only a dozen or two centimeters off the floor, but still. "Hey, it worked! Maybe now we c—" As her concentration wavered, gravity tugged her back down. She landed with a heavy thump, and only barely managed to stay standing. "... guess I'll need to practice with it."

Sanae looked even more shocked than she was. She only pulled her hand back as an afterthought, then looked at it in amazement. "... does this mean I'm, really. Um. You know?"

"You're a goddess!"  
  
“You're a goddess!” The echo came from the doorway behind Reimu, but she didn't need to turn around to know Marisa's voice when she heard it. Without waiting for an invitation, Marisa walked into the shrine and flopped down on the floor, looking up at Sanae curiously. “Since when?”  
  
Sanae looked between the two uncertainly. “Since always, but I guess a lot more recently! … um. Where'd you come from?”  
  
“Well, see, here's the thing. There's this solar eclipse, right? And we're not supposed to get one for about a zillion years. So _I'm_ freaking out, and then Reisen comes over and _she's_ freaking out because they all think that it might be part of some Lunarian plot to come take them all away...”  
  
“Eh-heh.” Sanae hung her head, in embarrassment. “Sorry.”  
  
“… so, yeah, I was expecting some kinda incident when I showed up here. Although I guess seeing regular humans at this shrine is almost weird enough to count as an incident.”  
  
“Hmph, well!” Sanae crossed her arms, with a smug smile on her face. “That all changes today! Now that I'm this shrine's goddess, we're going to get a lot more worshipers!”  
  
“That so?”  
  
“It is!”  
  
“Well, that sounds like it's worth a celebration to me!” From inside the voluminous folds of her dress, Marisa started withdrawing bottles: One of sake, one of wine, another sake bottle...  
  
Reimu watched the collection of bottles with growing confusion. “Did you only come inside to have somebody to drink with?”  
  
“Hehe. Well, might as well not waste the trip, right?”  
  
“How did you even fit all of those bottles in there?”  
  
“Don't ask questions you don't wanna know the answer to.”  
  
“... well, where did you get them?”  
  
“Don't ask questions you don't wanna—”  
  
“Got it.” If Marisa was providing the drinks for once, Reimu wasn't going to complain. Besides, she supposed that an event like this did merit a little celebration. “One toast, okay? Then you're going home.”  
  
“Yeah, of course!” With a loud pop, Marisa jerked the cork out of a wine bottle, then thrust it into the air, splashing some of the contents on the floor. “To, uh, a new goddess!”


	3. Hangovers/Omamori

_THUMP THUMP THUMP_

_THUMP THUMP THUMP_

Jolted awake by the noise, Reimu grumbled. "Shut up, 'm trying to sleep..."

_THUMP THUMP THUMP_

_THUMP THUMP THUMP_

"Go _'way_." She was suddenly aware that there was sunlight shining on her face. It was very much morning outside, apparently. She rolled over to turn away from the window...

... and her hand brushed against somebody else's.

That was enough to finally jolt her to full awareness. She sat straight up, and the scene around her quickly reminded her of the events of the previous night. The inside of the shrine still looked like a bit of a disaster area. Scattered across the floor was an assortment of now-empty sake and wine bottles. In one corner, the pile of coins Reimu had dumped out of the donations box. Next to her, Sanae, sleeping in an oversized t-shirt and doing her best to share Reimu's futon. Sprawled over the table, Marisa, still fully-dressed from the previous night, but also awake, too. Barely.

"Oi, Reimu, are you gonna get the door?" Marisa groaned and pushed her hat down over her eyes to shield them from the light.

"You could get it too, you know..." With a yawn, Reimu pushed herself off the futon, and slowly realized that she was still wearing her clothes from last night, too. Or most of them, at least. One of her sleeves had vanished, but she'd deal with that later.

_THUMP THUMP THUMP_

"I'm _coming_." Reimu stumbled over to the door, suddenly aware that she had a headache and was a little dizzy. She briefly wondered how much she'd had to drink last night, but as her foot brushed against an empty sake bottle, decided that the short answer was probably 'too much.' Leaning against the doorway for support, Reimu pushed it open.

The light outside sent a new pang through Reimu's aching head, and her eyes struggled to adjust. Suwako was standing on the front step, with Kanako carrying a box just behind her. Kanako looked at Reimu critically, noting her state of semi-dress. "I'd say good morning, but it's about twenty minutes until the afternoon. Can we come in?"

* * *

Getting everybody woken up and presentably dressed, then clearing enough space on the floor for them to sit, took a few minutes. The light exertion cleared Reimu's head a little, at least.

Which was good, because nobody else was rushing to help. When there was finally some clear space on the floor, Kanako took a seat across from Sanae. "I hear that you're officially the kami of the Hakurei shrine now.”

"Sure am..." Sanae's enthusiasm was blunted this morning. To Reimu's eyes, she looked like a pretty sad excuse for a goddess—hair half-matted and sticking out in every direction and eyes bloodshot from her hangover. At some point during the night, she'd changed into a baggy t-shirt with a cartoon cat on the front and a pair of pajama pants.

"Well, congratulations."

Suwako ruffled Sanae's hair on her way past, then took her own seat at the table. "Congratulations!"

"Thanks..."

Sanae leaned backward and yawned, and it prompted an even bigger yawn from Marisa, who then looked up and announced, "I'm hungry."

"It _is_ time for breakfast," Sanae agreed.

Reimu slowly realized that they were both looking at her expectantly. She scowled. "W-why are you looking at me! I'm not a maid!"

"We already ate. … but it _is_ lunch time," Kanako said.

"You don't even live here!"

"Too late, Reimu." Marisa yawned again and slumped forward to rest her chin on the table. "Looks like it's you versus the goddesses."

"You're not a goddess, Marisa."

"... _yet._ "

Suwako eyed Marisa thoughtfully. "You know, if there was one more, Shinto shrines would outnumber the Buddhists and Taoists combined..."

"Don't give her ideas..." But the four had already fallen into lively debate, and it was threatening to bring Reimu's hangover headache back. She sighed. "Right, whatever. I'll go make breakfast."

* * *

'Breakfast,' in this case, turned out to be whatever Reimu could make with the food she had left. Feeding an extra person for a few days had already stretched her food supplies to their limits, and what little remained barely sufficed as a meal for four.

Thankfully, nobody complained. Half an hour later, Marisa had eaten her fill and left for home, Sanae looked slightly further from the brink of death, and the last of the food was rapidly vanishing.  
  
“So,” Kanako said as she pushed her now-empty plate away. “Have you thought about what forms your blessings will take?”  
  
“Hmm?” Sanae looked up from eating, then poked at her face until she managed to get a stray grain of rice off the corner of her mouth. “What do you mean?”  
  
“If you have worshipers, it's only a matter of time before somebody prays to ask you for something. How will you handle that?”  
  
“Oh.” Sanae laughed bashfully. “I hadn't really thought about it!”  
  
“Many kami prefer to focus on granting blessings in a single area...”  
  
“The Hakurei shrine already specializes in youkai extermination,” Reimu pointed out.  
  
“Youkai extermination is pretty fun!” Sanae said, then winced as she aggravated her headache. “But... it's not really necessary anymore, is it?”  
  
“... what do you mean?”  
  
“Well, youkai and humans seem to get along, don't they? I mean, maybe I'm still getting the hang of Gensokyo, but it seems like _exterminating_ most of them is... kinda going overboard.”  
  
“The reason the youkai are behaving is that they know I'll come for them if they start acting up!”  
  
“Hmm. Maybe.” Sanae twirled her chopsticks between her fingers thoughtfully. “But I don't know. Youkai extermination just sounds so... old-fashioned, doesn't it? A shrine for Gensokyo's future has to be more open-minded!”  
  
“... weren't you the one who just talked about how fun youkai extermination is?”  
  
“That was when I was a shrine maiden. Now that I'm a goddess, I've got to think bigger!” Sanae leaned across the table, grinning proudly at the next bit, “Besides, if it's not a youkai-extermination shrine, when there's an incident, you can beat up whichever side is in the wrong!”  
  
Suwako nudged Sanae with her elbow. “Trying to cut in on our youkai faith business, huh? Pretty tricky!”  
  
“Hehe. I'm not going to lose!”  
  
Reimu scowled. “The Hakurei shrine maiden's job isn't to beat up humans.” Well... okay. She'd fought Sanae that one time. And Marisa. And Sakuya. And Mokou. And Keine. And—okay, so humans did their fair share of disrupting the balance of Gensokyo, point taken. “A-anyway, we can't just go changing what the shrine stands for!”  
  
“Hmm?” Kanako said. “With your reputation for running a youkai shrine, I would have expected you to be happier about this.”  
  
“Well. I'm not.”  
  
“Come on, I'm the kami here. Let's give it a shot and see if it works! If not, we'll go back to the old way, I promise,” Sanae said, with a disarming smile.  
  
Reimu wanted to keep arguing the point, but seeing Sanae's confidence and enthusiasm made it difficult. She just seemed to speed ahead, sucking up anybody else in her wake. It was an appropriate enough trait for a goddess, Reimu supposed. “Fine, fine. No more youkai-extermination shrine, whatever. I guess it doesn't change much.” She leaned back, propping herself up with her hands, and eyed the two visitors. “... so why are you here?”  
  
“Well, we have to check on the competition, don't we? And...” Kanako reached down to the floor, then liftedthe box she'd brought and slid it across the table. “Sanae, you left a few things behind.”  
  
Sanae opened the box and poked through the contents. “Oh! My blow dryer. … although I guess it won't really work without electricity...”  
  
“Maybe if you can get this place up and running, we'll cut you a deal to run electricity to this shrine for, oh, a third of your faith.”  
  
“We can make it ourselves,” Reimu said, reaching over to push the lid to the box closed. She didn't really know how electricity was made, but she wasn't about to let Sanae get herself suckered into a bad deal over it.  
  
“I'm sure you can.” Kanako's sarcasm was so subdued that, by the time Reimu realized she was being mocked, the conversation had already moved on. She turned back to Sanae. “Other than all of that, how are you adjusting?”  
  
“I haven't really had time to do anything. I've spent most of the time I've been here getting ready for that miracle last night... Oh! Did you see the eclipse? I thought that was a pretty cool touch.”  
  
“Humans appreciate that sort of thing. You're a natural at this. Maybe Suwako and I should be scared.”  
  
Sanae grinned and crossed her arms confidently. “You should!”  
  
“Hmm. Well, since things seem to be coming along so well, why don't we have a friendly competition to see how far your shrine is coming?”  
  
Reimu's could tell that this was going nowhere good. Before she could cut in, though, Sanae said, “What kind of competition?”  
  
“It's about six weeks until New Year's. Even in Gensokyo, New Year's shrine visits are popular, right? So. Let's see who gets the most donations between midnight and dawn.”  
  
Reimu's stomach sank. Over the past few years, her donations from New Year's visits had been thin. Barely 1200 yen a year, tops, and that was counting 500 that Marisa had thrown in on a whim last year, and another 800 that those fairies had stolen from the donation box two years earlier. “Th-that's not fair, though! You two are more experienced at this stuff!”  
  
“We're also at the top of a mountain, and three times as far from the human village. Tengu and kappa aren't known for carrying much human currency. And if I remember correctly, didn't this shrine already hold a successful New Year's festival a few years ago?”  
  
Reimu scoffed. “Successful with youkai, maybe. They didn't donate anything, and left a giant mess.Besides, what do we get if we win?”  
  
“If you win? I'll have the kappa run electricity to this shrine.”  
  
“Deal!” Sanae didn't even hesitate.  
  
Suwako chimed in. “And if you lose... we get all of the donations from both shrines. For a month!”  
  
Reimu still didn't like this, but she was used to getting by on practically no donations. She suspected, actually, that the pair were taking it easy on them for some reason, but she wasn't about to protest it. And just like before, seeing that enthusiasm on Sanae's face, she couldn't say no. “Fine, okay. One month, that's it.”  
  
Kanako smirked, and Reimu got the feeling that she'd walked into some sort of trap. “In that case, shall we leave you two to your planning?”

* * *

There turned out to be more planning than Reimu had expected. She'd tried all sorts of ways to increase the shrine's popularity in the past, of course. New rituals designed to impress worshipers, declaring every interesting object that crossed her path to be a goshintai, keeping the shrine youkai-free for weeks in the hopes of dispelling its bad reputation... but none of them had led to more than a short-lived boost.  
  
Sanae, though, Sanae had Ideas. The two had argued for some time before settling on the first one to try: selling omamori. Reimu had spent two whole days inscribing papers with blessings and wrapping them in cloth before they were ready to hang on a pegboard outside. They were 500 yen apiece, and divided into several categories, which were clearly labeled on the board and written on the amulets' outer layers: Household Safety, Relationships, Studies, Protection from Youkai, Success In Business... and one that had been the subject of two hours of debate before they settled on a compromise, Protection From Unfair Extermination By Humans.  
  
Reimu had been arguing for Protection From Humans Except The Hakurei Shrine Maiden, but Sanae had gotten her to reluctantly agree that she only rarely _needed_ to exterminate a youkai for unfair reasons.  
  
Reimu hadn't had high hopes for the project, and the first day had seemed to prove her right. Despite hanging a few flyers in the village to announce the shrine's new service, not a single one had been sold. The next day, only one relationship talisman was missing from the board, and there wasn't a matching donation in the box. Reimu had propped a sign next to the board after that, reading, 'They only work if you donate!'  
  
The next day, nothing again.  
  
The day after, nine Protection From Unfair Extermination By Humans amulets were missing from the board, and the donation box contained 3300 yen.  
  
“I don't get it,” Reimu told Sanae, as the two ate breakfast the next morning. “Why would somebody take that many? It's not like anybody hunts youkai outside of incidents anyway.”  
  
Sanae shrugged. “If they're donating, it's fine, right? If we can keep doing three thousand yen a day, we'll never be short on money!”  
  
“It's nice...” Reimu conceded. “Even though it should've been more like four thousand. It's just weird.”  
  
The conversation drew to an end, and just as Reimu was getting ready to clean the dishes from the table, she heard conversation coming from outside. Dishes forgotten, she hurried over to the door, opened it just a crack, and peeked out... and was mildly displeased to find three fairies bent over, looking at the ones already on display.  
  
At least it was the three fairies who lived behind the shrine. Reimu knew that she could probably trust them to not do anything stupid as long as she could see them. She still sighed as she pushed the door open and stepped outside. “What do you three want?”  
  
Sunny Milk, who had always sort of been the self-proclaimed leader of the three, grinned as she turned toward Reimu. “We want to buy some of these things, and then we'll be invinc—mmphmph!”  
  
Star Sapphire had cut Sunny off by gently clamping a hand over her mouth, and now gave Reimu a disarming smile. “Um, actually, we were just a little curious about these. How do they work?”  
  
“They're omamori. If you carry them with you, you'll get whatever blessing it says on there. But,” Reimu hurried to add, “Only if you donate. They're 500 yen each.”  
  
“500 yen is a lot...”  
  
“That's 500 yen for the blessings of a goddess.” Reimu pointed at the sign next to the board. “And they don't work if you don't pay, so don't even think of trying to steal some.”  
  
“Hmmm.” The three fairies huddled together, then started emptying their pockets. Slowly, very slowly, a pile took shape on the floor between them: A glittering mountain of coins, mostly low denominations and mostly looking like they'd been picked up from muddy roadsides, along with a whistle, two sticks, a handful of gravel, and a small magnifying glass.  
  
“... how much is that?”  
  
“It's...” Luna Child glanced over the pile again, and looked up to Reimu hopefully. “1320 yen?”  
  
“... put it in the donation box, I guess. We'll call it even if you throw in the magnifying glass.” Honestly, Reimu didn't want to think too hard on where fairies had gotten that much money to begin with. As they scooped up the pile of coins and took off running toward the donation box, she added, “But why do you want one, anyway?”  
  
Star Sapphire was the first one back to the board. “Oh, well! Being blessed is neat, right? It sounds pretty powerful...”  
  
The three fairies each pulled a Protection From Unfair Extermination By Humans omamori from the peg, then crouched down on the floor in a circle again. From somewhere, one of them produced a small jar of ink and a brush, which got passed around. Reimu craned over them suspiciously. “What are you doing?”  
  
“This!” With a triumphant laugh, Sunny Milk turned around and held her omamori in the air. With the brush, she'd very carefully crossed out part of the writing on it: Protection From ~~Unfair Extermination By~~ Humans. “Now we're invincible!”  
  
“We can prank anybody we want, and they can't stop us!”  
  
“We can take all kinds of things from the village!”  
  
Reimu sighed. “That's... that's not how it works.”  
  
The fairies' enthusiasm faltered. Luna Child glanced down at hers uncertainly. “Cirno said it did...”  
  
“Did she test it?”  
  
The three glanced between each other. “... I'm not sure...”  
  
“I bet it does work! You just won't admit that it, because—!” Sunny Milk was cut off as Reimu idly tried to deliver a soft slap atop her head to prove that she was still mortal, but the fairy dodged backward. The blow whiffed harmlessly through the air, and she grinned in triumph. “See! We're invincible!”  
  
“I'm not sure it's...” Star Sapphire started to say, and Luna cut her off, wide-eyed and amazed. “... we're invincible...!”  
  
“... yeah, invincible, sure.” Reimu couldn't bring herself to argue any longer. Besides, if it was such an appealing-sounding effect that even fairies would pay, maybe it would be good for business. “Just don't get into _too_ much trouble, okay?”  
  
But they weren't listening. Holding the amulets in the air, the three were already dashing off toward the human village. Reimu let them go.  
  
By the next morning, five more Protection From Unfair Extermination By Humans omamori were missing from the peg, and while the donations were a bit short of the correct price again, they still easily covered the costs of making them. This time, Reimu made a double batch.


	4. A Rainy Day's Prayer/Unadon

Today it was raining. A torrential downpour, a bit weird for this late in the year. Between the rain and the chill, not even fairies were reckless enough to visit the shrine, so Reimu had brought the board holding the omamori inside, and was idly crafting replacements for the handful of them that had sold yesterday.  
  
The drone of the rain, coupled with the repetitive motions of writing the same inscriptions over and over, was combining to nearly put Reimu to sleep. After finishing one of the talismans, she put her brush down and stretched her cramped hand, then looked across the room. In the corner, Sanae was laying on her stomach on the floor, reading one of the many books she'd brought with her.  
  
Reimu still wasn't sure how she _felt_ about this whole situation. The two weeks since Sanae had moved into the shrine had been busy. Sanae had spent the days before the ceremony locked in her room and gathering power, then days of debating about how to promote the shrine and mass-producing omamori. They'd been living together for half a month, but this was one of the first times they'd both actually been _free_. The faith-gathering part of this venture seemed to be going well enough, but she still had no idea how well living together was going to work.  
  
Before Reimu could voice her concerns, Sanae looked up. Reimu realized that she'd been staring at her, and did her best to go back to looking very interested in crafting omamori, but Sanae didn't seem to have noticed. Reimu could feel the green-haired girl's eyes on her as she painted, until Sanae finally said, “Do you think I'm worthy of worship?”  
  
“... huh?” It wasn't quite the topic Reimu had been expecting. She paused mid-brushstroke. “What do you mean?”  
  
“Well... donations are a form of worship, right? But it doesn't really feel like I've earned it...” Sanae glanced toward the corner of the room, where a wooden box was holding all of the donations until Reimu could find somewhere more permanent for them. Altogether, they totaled to almost ten thousand yen, and much of that was from fairies, in one- and five-yen pieces. The box was threatening to overflow.  
  
“Most of that's from omamori, though.”  
  
“I guess. But... but still!” Sanae folded her book closed and sat up, turning to face Reimu, and Reimu realized she was serious about this. “If I'm gonna be a goddess, I've got to be worthy of worship, right?”  
  
“What about those goddesses at your old shrine? What's so great about them?”  
  
Sanae momentarily looked offended. “Lady Kanako can control the wind and the rain to bring good crops, and can out-think any human alive. Lady Suwako can control the earth and rock, and is really wise.”

“The eclipse thing was pretty impressive.”  
  
“If all I do is impress people enough to give me money, I'm more like a celebrity than a kami. Lady Suwako and Lady Kanako are... transcendent. Even if people worship me, I'm still just Sanae.”  
  
A drip of ink fell on Reimu's leg, and she realized a little too late that she was still holding her brush. She hurried to stow it next to the pot, then cleaned the ink from her leg as she answered. “Well, um. You seem pretty smart too, I guess. And you're... enthusiastic. I mean, before, all I did was try to keep the shrine running, and keep the youkai in line. I'm actually getting kind of excited about all of this now, though, and it's because you're here.” Reimu barely even realized what she was saying until the words were out of her mouth, but it was true, she realized. She really was starting to actually _care_ about her duties, rather than just performing them out of obligation.  
  
Too late, Reimu saw that Sanae was blushing at her response, and hurried to add, “I-I mean! I guess it helps seeing people actually donate to the shrine occasionally. It was kind of hard making myself care when nobody else did, you know?”  
  
Slowly, the color drained from Sanae's cheeks. “Right, right, that makes sense. I guess I just don't feel very goddess-y right now. The past few days, I've mostly just been sitting in my room reading and stuff and trying not to go crazy from boredom.”  
  
“Oh. Well, now that I'm not preparing for things or making omamori all day anymore, we could do stuff. Like,” Reimu said, then trailed off. Truthfully, she didn't really know what to _suggest_. Her only really regular visitor was Marisa, and Marisa always brought her own entertainment: some weird rock she'd found, or a story about some new thing that had drifted over from the outside world, or intensely exaggerated retellings of spellcard duels she'd had recently. Most other visitors she got were the kind who just wanted to drink all her sake and then fall asleep on the floor. She wasn't really sure how to entertain somebody almost _normal_ in the shrine all day. “... um, we could think of something, I guess.”  
  
“That would be nice, but it's not just about keeping myself busy. I need to...” Sanae cut off, as the unmistakable noise of somebody shaking the shrine's bell sounded outside.  
  
“Somebody's making a donation in _this_ kind of weather? They must be desperate.” Reimu stood and started toward the door to see who was outside, but Sanae raised a hand to stop her.  
  
“Wait,” she said, wide-eyed. “She's, um. She's... praying.”  
  
Reimu stopped mid-step, and the shrine fell into complete silence apart from the drone of the rain on the roof. It was nearly twenty seconds before Sanae relaxed with a sigh and announced, “She's done.”  
  
“How can you tell?”  
  
“It's not much of a prayer if the one you're praying to can't hear it...”  
  
“You could hear it?”  
  
“Yeah! Um. In my head, kind of.”  
  
“Huh.” Reimu looked uncertainly between Sanae and the direction of the collections box as she considered all the ramifications of _that_. “... what did she want?”  
  
“That's confidential information between a goddess and worshiper,” Sanae said with a wink as she rose to her feet. “I think I'm going to head down to the human village. Do you want to come?”  
  
Reimu held Sanae's gaze, trying to find some clue to what this was about, but the other girl's expression was a perfectly cryptic smile. “... sure, I guess. Let me find my umbrella.”

* * *

Reimu waited on the porch for Sanae for a good ten minutes before the newly-minted goddess joined her. When Sanae opened the door and stepped out, Reimu was surprised to see that she was wearing the outfit she'd worn for the ritual a few nights ago. The surprise apparently showed on her face, because Sanae laughed as she opened her umbrella. “If I'm going out on kami business, I should dress the part, right?”

“Sure, I guess...” It all made Reimu feel a bit plain standing next to her. She had to hand it to Alice: the outfit would make practically anybody look like a goddess.

But maybe even moreso for Sanae. The earnest, straightforward way that she just seemed to drift through life made the flowing garment seem strangely suitable for her. More than once, Reimu found her eyes drifting to the other girl's form as they walked down the rarely-used trail toward the human village. ... and more than once, she slipped in the mud and found herself hoping, not for the first time, that she regained her ability to fly soon.

The path meandered through a thick band of forest overlooking the village, shielding the two enough that they could fold their umbrellas for the moment. Distantly, very distantly, the sounds of fairies laughing echoed through the trees. Reimu shivered. Without the familiar weight of her gohei and a stack of ofuda, even the threat of fairies was enough to make her nervous. Sanae could probably take care of them if it came down to it, but still. Reimu picked up her pace a little. Maybe this kind of thing was why people from the village were scared of visiting the shrine. “... hey, Sanae?”

“Hmm?”

“I've been wondering. Why'd you move to Gensokyo in the first place?”

“What do you mean? The shrine moved here because humans' faith was waning.”

“But you didn't have to come with it, did you? And the outside world has electricity everywhere, and no youkai, right? So why'd you leave _that_ for here?”

“I guess it's... well, the reason there aren't many youkai in the outside world is that humans don't believe in them. Just like they don't have as much faith in the kami.” Sanae drew to a stop and looked out into the forest with a smile. “I think it's more fun to believe in things, don't you?”

Reimu reluctantly stopped too, and tried to convince herself that it wasn't because she'd feel unsafe if she got too far from Sanae. Maybe she really did need to do something to scare the youkai out of these woods when she got her powers back. “Why's it matter to you, though?”

“A world with those things is more interesting than one without them!” Sanae said, with a confident grin on her face. “Wouldn't you be sad if all the youkai disappeared?”

“... I... guess.”

“My first week I was here, I met a tengu. And the other day, fairies came to the shrine, right! Doesn't it kind of feel like every day's an adventure, even if it's just a little one? In the outside world... my teachers were telling me that I'd have to go to college and only look after the shrine part-time if I wanted to amount to anything. Here, I can do anything I want.” Sanae looked down at her outfit with a smirk. “Even become a goddess, apparently.”

Reimu's first instinct was to shake her head and sigh, but she found a smile creeping onto her face despite herself. “Jeez, you're hopeless.” With a smile still on her face, she turned back toward the village. “Come on, _goddess_ , I still want to see what this trip's about.”

* * *

Reimu finally managed to relax when the pair passed back out into the open, even though it meant that she had to use her umbrella again. From the small hill, they could see the lights of the human village below, shining through the mist of the rain. It had been ages since Reimu had seen it from this angle—these days, she usually flew. Viewing it from the ground made it clear just how much the village had grown in the past decade or so. A few landmarks that she remembered from walks to the village when she was a kid, trees and small outcroppings of rock, now almost lay inside its borders.

Inside the village itself, daily life was muted by the rain. Only a few dogs and children too reckless to stay dry were out running about in the streets, while everybody else hurried from door to door, carrying umbrellas. There were still enough people sitting on porches and watching the rain through open doors to give the pair a bit of an audience, and Sanae's unconventional form of dress made sure that every spectator's eyes followed them down the street.

Embarrassed at the attention, Reimu lowered her umbrella a bit to shield her face and hurried forward, only for Sanae to turn and gently pull her through the door of a restaurant.

"Huh...?"

"This is our destination," Sanae said simply, then, "Two, please," when the hostess approached.

As Reimu's eyes adjusted, she found herself in a small, cramped room, with only enough space for a couple of tables. Almost instantly after they were seated, the hostess hurried out to pour them each a cup of tea.

"The girl who prayed at the shine earlier was from here," Sanae whispered across the table once they were alone again, then looked to the side. Reimu followed her gaze just quickly enough to catch a glimpse of a girl, barely twelve years old if that, peeping at them. Her hair was still wet from the long walk in the rain, and when she noticed the pair looking at her, she ducked back behind cover. "Apparently business is kind of slow right now, because she prayed for her family to make more money..."

"So why are _we_ here?" Reimu asked, her voice a hiss as she tried to whisper low enough that nobody would overhear the two.

"Well, I could probably perform a miracle to make their business pick up, but I thought I should probably eat here first! Maybe they just need to change their recipes or something."

"Can you really fulfill a prayer by giving somebody cooking advice?"

"Sure! Why not? Besides, I'd feel bad if I made this place into the most popular restaurant in Gensokyo and the food kind of sucked," Sanae said, then quieted down just as the hostess approached again. "Ah, could we please get two unadon?"

Reimu frowned. "I didn't bring any money, you know..."

"Ah, don't worry! I've got it covered." Sanae dangled a small coin pouch and gave it a shake to send the contents jingling. "I grabbed some cash from the donations."

"Y-you can't just take those!"

Reimu tried to snatch the pouch up, but Sanae idly jerked it back. "Why not? They're ultimately donations to me, right? Besides, who's going to stop me? I'm a goddess."

Reimu wanted to smack the smug grin off of Sanae's face, but she couldn't really find any moral grounds on which to oppose her. Sanae was right, if anybody had a right to the donations, it was her. Reimu was just used to not having to split them with anybody, and more importantly, getting so few that every single yen had to be saved up and spent as prudently as possible.

Needless to say, this was the first time she'd eaten out in a while.

Since they were the only customers, it didn't take long before the hostess carried two bowls of unadon out to the table. As she dug in Reimu wanted to point out that it was pretty good—totally blessing-worthy—but the atmosphere of the restaurant made her reluctant to say much. Behind the counter, she could see the hostess and the chef whispering to each other and glancing at them over their shoulders. This time, she had no umbrella to hide behind, so she merely fixated her eyes on her bowl and ate as quickly as possible.  
  
From outside came the distant sound of shouting. Reimu looked idly out the window as she finished off her tea. The rain had cleared up, at least.

"This is pretty good," Sanae said, as she poked the last bite of rice into her mouth. "I think I'm going to do the miracle thing."

"It's not going to take four days again, is it?"

"Nope! Something this simple should only take a few minutes to pull off. Hold on." Sanae rolled her shoulders to loosen up, then lowered her head in concentration.

Of course, the hostess chose that exact moment to come collect the payment. She gave a bit of an odd look when Reimu reached over to pluck the coin pouch away from Sanae in order to pay it, and the only thing Reimu could say in response was, "We'll just be a few more minutes. Sorry."

The hostess took the payment without further hesitation. Reimu sighed. Now that she didn't even have anybody to talk to, she could actually just barely hear the whispering coming from the back room. She turned to look out the window and did her best to ignore it.  
  
Outside, a fairy ran past, carrying a thrashing carp as big as she was overhead. Reimu, deep in thought, paid it no mind.  
  
Was this really okay? The shrine was making money for the first time in practically forever, and Sanae seemed to be adjusting to the role of goddess naturally, but Reimu still couldn't shake the feeling that there was something more that she should be doing. But maybe it was just a sign that she was still struggling to adjust, she figured. There had been a lot of changes in the past couple of weeks: Having people start visiting the shrine, changes in the ways she did business, having Sanae go from a slightly distant friend and rival to her roommate... maybe it would all come to feel more natural in time.  
  
The fairy ran past the window again, got her sleeve grabbed by one of the humans who was now chasing her, and tripped, sending the fish flying. The humans tried to pin her down, but she fired off a barrage of showy, but harmless, leaf-shaped danmaku, then took off dashing again when they backed off.  
  
Reimu snapped out of her thought, and her eyes finally focused on the scene outside the window. She glanced to Sanae, but she was still deep in concentration. Well. Okay, then. Reimu approached the door, cracked it open, and peeked outside...  
  
The entire village was like that. The fairy she'd seen was just one of the dozens that were now running around the place . Fairies leaping across the rooftops. Fairies sprinting away from shops with armfuls of stolen sake bottles. Fairies with cans of paint, collaborating to scrawl childish pictures on the sides of buildings.  
  
And every single one of them was carrying a Protection From ~~Unfair Extermination By~~ Humans omamori.  
  
Reimu slammed the door shut. “S-sanae! We need to go, _now_.”


	5. The Great Fairy Riot/Worship

“I knew that making blessings for youkai was a bad idea. I knew it.”

“There has to be some way to stop them...”

Reimu and Sanae had been standing outside for a good five minutes now. Reimu had tried shouting at the fairies, and while they'd been a _bit_ frightened of the pissed-off Hakurei shrine maiden, they'd quickly noticed that she wasn't shooting anybody and gone back to their mayhem. And now that most of the villagers had noticed the fairies, there wasn't exactly a shortage of people shouting at them.

Reimu glanced up the road toward the shrine. “I hate to say it, but... maybe we should go back and get your miko gear. You can probably still call on those Moriya goddesses, right?”

“Maybe... I'd rather not give them the satisfaction, though.”

“I can't do anything, so unless you want to pull out some goddess powers, then—“ Reimu's train of thought stopped very abruptly, as Sanae grabbed her hand.

“When we did this before, you were able to fly, right? This is a bit more awkward than just using the goshintai, but...” Still holding Reimu's hand, Sanae carefully stepped away from a nearby building, where two particularly reckless fairies were rolling potted plants down the slope of the roof and cheering. “Desperate times call for desperate measures, right?”

“I don't have any ofuda, though...”

“I never had any at all. I was just able to draw on the goddesses' powers to shoot, um. Laser snakes. … maybe you can do something like that too?”

"This is silly."

"Well, we still have to _try_."

Grumbling, Reimu closed her eyes and concentrated. This time, drawing on Sanae's power was easier—had she gotten that much more powerful already?—but still nowhere near as familiar as tapping into the yin-yang orb. Reimu gradually forced herself to relax as she grew more confident in her control, and when she opened her eyes and allowed herself to exhale a few seconds later, she and Sanae were both levitating half a meter off the ground.

"Not bad! We'll make a shrine maiden out of you yet."

"Ha."

"Can you shoot...?"

Reimu raised her free hand and looked at it uncertainly. She'd been fighting with ofuda and her gohei almost since she was old enough to walk. Shooting lasers and bullets of energy was pretty normal in Gensokyo, but she was used to something with more... mass. "Um, hmm." Reimu squinted and focused on the trickle of power she could feel flowing into her from Sanae, trying to figure out how to coax it forward into an attack.

More power welled into her chest, and Reimu shivered in surprise, Where drawing on the former Hakurei kami through the yin-yang orb had felt distant, a stable, bottomless well of tamed power, this felt... raw. Raw and volatile. It flowed into her in a jagged, unstable, tingling stream, and she felt _connected_ to Sanae .  
  
For just a moment, Reimu realized that she could _feel_ that Sanae was just as surprised by all of this as she was. Their spirits connected, Reimu was experiencing Sanae's emotions just as clearly as her own. The two exchanged stunned glances, and not until a burst of stray fairy danmaku clattered against the wall nearby did they snap out of it enough for Sanae to stammer, "T-try shooting!”

Reimu lifted her hand again, and now that she'd tapped into the energy, it felt almost natural to project it with a flick of her wrist. A small cloud of energy coalesced into a single hazy white bullet in front of her palm, then ricocheted off the cobblestones.

Reimu sighed in relief. After two weeks of being powerless, it felt nice to even do that much. "Great. Let's hunt some fairies."

* * *

It would go down in Reimu's mind as the lamest youkai hunt she'd gone on since she was a child. Tethered to Sanae and still only able to fly slowly, Reimu's normally legendary dodging skills had all the grace of a drunken cow. She only had one free hand and was unfamiliar with the strange energy bullets, so she couldn't use any of her familiar spell cards, and could only fire short, scattershot bursts.

Fortunately, she was fighting fairies, so these weren't unreasonable handicaps.

Once Reimu started shooting, and especially once the first few got pegged with attacks, the fairies quickly caught on that this wasn't going to end well for them. Most of them scattered. Reimu caught a glimpse of the Three Fairies of Light sneaking away, partially hidden by a field of light refraction, and she made a note to chastise them later.

But there was no doubt in Reimu's mind who had started this whole thing, and only once the prime suspect was knocked over by a blast of bullets mid-retreat did Reimu let go of Sanae's hand. "Th-those other fairies said you couldn't shoot anymore!" Cirno whined, from her spot sprawled on the ground.

"I couldn't. I got better. ... what do you fairies think you're doing?"

"I'm invincible! You can't hurt me!"

Reimu noticed that Cirno did have a handful of the omamori tied to her wrists. "... that's not how they work. That's really not how they work when you write on them."

"... w-well." It was practically the first time that Reimu had ever seen the headstrong fairy falter, but she quickly recovered. "Well, w-when we _are_ invincible, then you'll really learn to respect fairies, y'know!"

"Right, right." Reimu turned around, and while Cirno continued to ramble, she did her best to ignore it. At some point, a few dozen humans had worked up the courage to come watch the last stages of the fight, and were now gathered around the three. "Everything's okay now, you're safe," she said tiredly. As the crowd started dispersing, she raised her voice and added, "If you appreciate that kind of thing, maybe you could think about donating!"

If anybody heard Reimu, they certainly didn't give any indication. With a sigh, she turned back to Sanae. "Let's get our stuff and go home, I—"

Sanae was slumped on the ground. She weakly lifted her head, and her eyes strained to focus. "Might need some help..."

* * *

The walk home was a long one. The journey from the village to the shrine was mostly uphill, and Reimu had to do it with Sanae practically carried on one shoulder and two umbrellas held over the other. ... if it had been anything _but_ umbrellas, Reimu would have just left them in the village, but she really didn't want to add a scolding visit from Kogasa to the day's events.

Somehow, she made it to the shrine, and after pushing the door open with an umbrella, tossed them aside and hurried Sanae into her room to lower her onto her futon. Sanae only barely managed to squirm into place. Unsure of anything else she could do to help, she brushed Sanae's hair back out of her face. "How do you feel...?"

"Just... tired."

"Is there anything you need, or...?"

Sanae weakly shook her head. "Maybe later."

Reimu sat and watched over her, feeling like she ought to be doing _something_ , but within minutes, Sanae was sound asleep. Reluctantly, Reimu left her side and pulled the windows closed, then stepped out into the main room. It was already early in the evening, but she found things to do for a few hours, and checked on Sanae every now and then. Finally, after counting the donations for the third time, restocking the omamori, and sweeping the front step, she didn't have many excuses to stay awake. After checking on Sanae one last time, Reimu slid into her own futon and only slowly drifted to sleep.

* * *

In the morning, Sanae was no better. Reimu gently tried to wake her, but with no result.  
  
Sanae didn't wake up the entire day after the trip. Reimu slept fitfully that night.  
  
The second morning, Sanae still slept through Reimu's attempts to wake her. Reimu was worried now. Maybe in the afternoon she'd take the walk to Eientei to see if she could get any medicine for this. Since she didn't want to risk drawing on Sanae's power again while she was like this, it would be a long, long walk, going through the forest, down the hill, around the village, grazing the edge of the Forest of Magic, and into the Bamboo Forest of the Lost. The better part of an afternoon, assuming she didn't get lost in the forest. At best, she'd be walking back in the evening.

But first: Breakfast. After a little debate, Reimu decided to stick with miso soup and rice, and enough for two. Sanae was still sound asleep when Reimu carried her portions in, though, and Reimu tiptoed out of the room after leaving it by her side.

Back in the main room, sitting at the table and already eating, was Yukari. Without looking up from her food, she said, "Ah, taking offerings to your new goddess?"

Reimu paused mid-step. At this point, having Yukari show up at the shrine uninvited was such a part of normal life that she barely even missed a beat. "Huh? No."

"But humans do give offerings of food and sake to the kami as an act of worship. What's the difference?"

"The difference is it wasn't an 'act of worship,' it was breakfast." As Yukari popped one of the larger bits of fish from the soup in her mouth, Reimu realized that the meal the youkai was eating was _hers_ , and hurried over to push her away from the table. "G-give me that!"

"Ahh, well." Yukari let herself be pushed away without resistance, and almost without interrupting the flow of the conversation. "She could probably use some offerings and worship after that fight."

"I—Wait, how do you know about that?"

Without responding, Yukari withdrew a copy of the Kakashi Spirit News from a gap, then tossed it underhanded over the table. It was still folded, but Reimu got the gist from the headline: "NEW POWERS FOR THE HAKUREI SHRINE MAIDEN?", coupled with a half-page picture of herself and Sanae holding hands, while Reimu bowled over a fairy with a blast of slipshod danmaku from her fingers. With an embarrassed groan, Reimu snatched up the paper.

"Yes, I was upset too. She didn't even mention that you were holding hands the entire time until the second paragraph. I'd expect that kind of restraint from the Bunbunmaru, but I hope for more gossip and speculation in the Kaka—" Yukari was interrupted as Reimu hurled the newspaper at her face, but somehow managed to raise and open her parasol in time to deflect it.

Reimu picked at her meal and slowly managed to turn her thoughts back to the situation at hand. "... wait. Sanae's sick or something. Is that what you're talking about?"

"Well, I'm hardly a doctor. But while it's true that an shinrei, such as she is now, won't die if she runs out of faith, faith still strengthens her. Most likely, you temporarily exhausted her power last night. You might even have used all of her faith and drawn on her own spiritual reserves. If so, she's not sick. Just very tired."

"I didn't do that much..."

"She hasn't had time to gather much faith yet, either."

Reimu sighed. "As long as she'll get better naturally."

"Well, some more worship would help. Perhaps you could contribute"

"… _I_ can't worship her."

"Why not?"

"She's just..." Reimu stopped, with her chopsticks midway to her mouth. "She's _Sanae_."

"I see, I see. Even though you just took her offerings of food."

"That's not the same."

"Hmm, is it not? Over the years, humans have added layers of ritual, but at its core, worship and offerings are all meant to make a kami feel revered and appreciated." Yukari gathered up her discarded newspaper and rose to standing. "If it helps, think of it like she actually is sick. Keep her well-fed and make sure that she knows she's in your thoughts, and she'll be better in no time."

"I guess... I still think it would be weird to pray to her."

"Perhaps. I should be off. But good luck on your bet with the Moriya Shrine. I think that you'd find that a surprising number of youkai are cheering for you."

"Thanks, I guess."

Yukari stepped toward the door, but stopped with it half-open. "Reimu?"

"Hmm?"

"If the miko of a shrine can't bring herself worship its kami, how can anybody else be expected to?"

Reimu couldn't come up with an answer to that in the half-second that Yukari paused. She would swear, though, that the youkai had a smirk on her face as she closed the door behind herself.

* * *

Sanae's room already seemed odd to Reimu when it was lit, but now, with only a bit of sunlight seeping in, it was even more mysterious. The strange electronics that were piled uselessly by the window cast long shadows, and there was just enough light to see the faces of weird, drawn characters peering down at her from posters on the walls. She felt the need to avoid their eyes as she knelt down next to Sanae.

Across from her, the soup and rice she'd brought in earlier were still sitting untouched. Sanae, too, was in the same position she'd been the last time Reimu entered. If it weren't for the almost-undetectable rise and fall of her chest as she breathed, Reimu would be inclined to check for a pulse.

If Yukari was right, the food she'd brought would be a start, except for the fact that Sanae wasn't awake to eat it. There were other options, but they were... less straightforward.

The obvious one was praying, huh?

Reimu had never really _done_ the prayer thing. She'd tended to the shrine, dutifully carried out all the rituals that the few available texts told her were important for the well-being of its kami and the land, come up with hundreds of schemes for increasing the shrine's prestige, but the kami had only come to mind rarely in the past few years. It was only natural, really. She'd _met_ kami, and beaten them up to boot. Touching the supernatural every day, it was hard to maintain any belief or reverence for a distant kami, silent apart from the powers it granted Reimu through the yin-yang orb.

So. Prayer. Reimu fidgeted as she looked over the sleeping girl. She still didn't really know where things stood between her and Sanae. When she'd first arrived in Gensokyo, they'd been rivals. In the years afterward, though, they'd fallen into a strange friendship. One mostly instigated by Sanae, finding some excuse to stop by the shrine every time she went into the village. At the time, Reimu had thought that she was trying to learn more about being a shrine maiden in Gensokyo, or had just been trying to keep tabs on a rival.

Now... now she wasn't so sure. Maybe they'd just been friends all along and Reimu had been too dense to notice it. It was hard to accuse her of ulterior motives when they were working together to improve the shrine, after all. Any doubts Reimu might have had about that were dispelled during the fight against the fairy mob. That touch of Sanae's mind... it had been all the convincing she could ever need. They'd been linked for the entire fight, until Sanae started getting exhausted, and no secret was going to withstand that scrutiny. She'd been too distracted by the fight to pay it much attention at the time, but the lingering impressions still remained. Sanae had been shocked and overjoyed at her power, anxious about even the minor threat of the fairies, and... strangely pleased about fighting alongside Reimu.

Sanae was apparently dedicated to helping the shrine succeed. If she needed help from Reimu, well... failure had never been an option for the Hakurei shrine maiden before, and Reimu wasn't about to start.

* * *

The little rituals of prayer were something that Reimu had only done a few times in the past several years, and usually to demonstrate for the few first-time visitors to the shrine. The motions were still almost reflexive, somehow. Cleanse left hand with water, cleanse right hand, rinse mouth, ring the bell. She wasn't about to toss a donation in—anything she could put in the donation box would have come from there in the first place. Bow, clap, pray.

Prayer. Reimu thought back to Yukari's words: Reverence and appreciation, huh? Reverence was something that Reimu wasn't sure she could ever give to anybody. She'd met avatars and ancient kami alike, and none of them had struck her as more than well-behaved youkai. But appreciation... for Sanae, she could do appreciation.

What was there to appreciate about Sanae?

Well, there was her companionship. It had been hard to ignore over the past few weeks. It was a new experience. To the human villagers, Reimu had been an unwanted burden, too young to take care of herself after her parents had died. As she got older, they occasionally turned to her for protection, but she'd never really been one of them. Marisa had been the first person she could call a friend, and the only one for a long time.

But even she and Marisa had their differences. Marisa was great to have at your back during an incident, but her goals were not Reimu's goals. In Sanae, maybe, just maybe, for the first time, she had somebody she could call a partner. Somebody who could help shoulder her burdens.

The mental communion had been brief, but the longer she thought back to it, the more convinced she was that Sanae could be that person. It was a giddy realization. For her entire life, being the Hakurei shrine maiden had meant being the sole pillar that supported Gensokyo, depending on nobody. Maybe now, that was no longer the case.

Reimu was grateful for that.

Her enthusiasm. That was another thing. Truthfully, Reimu had made fun of it a few times to Marisa, the newbie shrine maiden from the outside world who approached youkai extermination like it was a game, but that was apparently Sanae's approach to everything. It was... endearing. A memory of Sanae grinning that fucking goofy grin of hers came to mind, and Reimu found herself smiling.

That... okay, Reimu was grateful for Sanae's enthusiasm, she supposed, but she was getting distracted. What else?

The fight against the fairies. Right. She'd been joined with Sanae's emotions, there had to be something _there_. The memories of that came drifting back to her. The taste of Sanae's excitement, anxiety, and pride, the feeling of power flowing from Sanae's spirit to hers, the feeling of Sanae holding her hand—it was the first time she'd held _anybody's_ hand since she was a child, and just remembering it was enough to bring a warm rush of blood to her cheeks and—  
  
Reimu cringed. She was kind of bad at this. At the very least, that really didn't seem like the kind of thing you were intended to be thanking a kami for in prayers. She struggled to drag her thoughts back on track. Um, um, what else was there... The memory of Sanae walking beside her on the way to the village, her gauzy outfit clinging ever-so-slightly to her body in the humid air—  
  
No no no no nonononoNO. It was no use. Even if she could think of something else, she was so flustered now that she couldn't possibly concentrate...  
  
“Reimu?”  
  
Her eyes snapped open. Standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame for support, was Sanae.  
  
Reimu started to open her mouth, then froze. If Sanae was awake, had the prayers worked? … more importantly, if Sanae was awake, had she _heard_? Reimu stared, half-expecting the bomb to drop at any second, but Sanae seemed pretty dazed, herself.  
  
From the depths of the donation box, the glint of reflected light caught Reimu's attention. There were a handful of coins down there. She breathed a sigh of relief. Obviously _that_ was what had happened. A few people from the village had donated, and that had been what gave Sanae enough power to wake up. Reimu's attempts at prayer had probably been too feeble to even count. She hurriedly knelt down to open the box and scoop up the contents. “A-ah, good morning! I'm just emptying the donations box!”  
  
“Okay.” Sanae brushed her messy hair out of her face and yawned. “... what time is it?”  
  
“It's the middle of the morning. … you've been asleep for two days.”  
  
“Oh.”  
  
Reimu straightened up and brushed a little dirt off her knees as she pocketed the donations. “How do you feel?”  
  
“I'm still a little tired... was I sick or something?”  
  
“Kind of. Have you eaten yet?”  
  
“Nope. Sorry, the stuff you let for me was kinda cold.”  
  
Reimu's thoughts drifted back to her prayers as she looked over Sanae. Even if Sanae hadn't heard any of it, what _had_ that been? Had the brief communion affected her so heavily? Even now, with Sanae's hair matted and disheveled from sleep and her goddess outfit wrinkled and dirty from the outing days ago, Reimu found her eyes drifting down to where her tummy peeked out from a gap in her clothes. It was... cute.  
  
Reimu felt her blush returning with a vengeance. Okay, so. She could deal with _that_ later. Right now, she suddenly realized that she'd been standing in silence for about five seconds, and Sanae was starting to look worried. “R-right, I guess it's been a while. Why don't you go have a bath, and I'll make you something warm.”  
  
“Sure.” Sanae headed back inside without argument, and Reimu breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn't sure when she'd started developing a crush on the shrine's new goddess, but it certainly didn't seem like it was going to make life any simpler.


	6. Nitori Torii/Practice

Reimu's plan had sounded brilliant to her, back when she'd first pitched it: Put up torii and lanterns along the path to the human village, all the way from the shrine to the other side of the forest. The lanterns would make the forest feel safer, and the torii closest to the human village would be visible from there, hopefully encouraging people to visit now and then. She'd thought it up in the days after Sanae had recovered from the trip, and had been pretty proud of it at the time.  
  
That had been a week ago.  
  
“Hey, Reimu!” Nitori shouted, quite loudly to make herself heard. “Is this a good spot for one?”  
  
“Sure, sure...” Reimu waved a hand to signal her acceptance, and Nitori proceeded.

Reimu didn't know what to call the... _thing_ that Nitori had assembled for the job. It was some kind of loud, clattering wheeled vehicle, which Nitori was controlling with dozens of levers. An arm extended from the front and ended in some kind of massive claw, which itself contained a dazzling array of smaller mechanisms.  
  
Nitori yanked one of the levers. In response, the claw lashed out, easily wrapped around a tree, and got to work. As it moved upward, dozens of buzzing gears ground the tree's trunk to a perfectly smooth cylinder, while trailing nozzles sprayed the newly-round portion with red paint. Once enough of the tree had been processed, massive shears snipped the top of the tree off. The machine hurled this away, then uprooted the trunk, turned, and slammed it into the ground alongside the path.  
  
Boom. One torii post.  
  
Reimu had to admit, the machine was impressive. It could craft and erect an entire torii in a matter of minutes, which was way faster than the human craftsmen she'd approached could handle. Nitori was even doing the job for cheap. Even if this didn't work, she wouldn't have much to complain about.  
  
Except for the fact that she'd now spent three days out here, watching Nitori erect the torii. The whole past week had been like this, actually. Contacting human and youkai craftsmen to see who could handle the job, negotiating prices, planning how many of them to make, and then overseeing the construction. Over the past week, Reimu had barely had time to sleep, let alone spend any time around Sanae.  
  
It was sort of a blessing, in its own way. She was still kind of baffled by her feelings toward her former rival. She caught herself now, sometimes—sneaking glances at Sanae when the two sat down to eat, or zoning out and daydreaming about her when she was supposed to be doing other things, or—  
  
“W-watch out!” Nitori's squeal was loud enough to be heard over the machine she was driving, and Reimu snapped back to attention just in time to see a red beam swinging toward her head. She ducked down, and Nitori raised it up to span between the two poles she'd erected on either side of the path.  
  
Suddenly frightened for the safety of her head, Reimu decided to step well away from the area where Nitori was working. She glanced back the path, and the sight reassured her that this would be worth it in the end. The torii already covered most of a kilometer, and her guesses had been right. Between the bright color and the lanterns hanging from them, they did a lot to make the forest look less dangerous. _She_ would have felt safer if the path had looked like this during her walk to the village. Hopefully the villagers would agree.  
  
This, too, was a side effect of Sanae's presence. Reimu's plans to improve the shrine had formerly been little more than get-rich-quick schemes. Now that she'd seen what had happened when Sanae exhausted her faith, more lasting ideas seemed to be coming to her quickly.  
  
And slowly but surely, it was getting better. The fairies had mostly stopped buying omamori since the fight in the village, but humans had picked up their slack. Now, a few of them were visiting per day... most of them just seemed cautiously curious about the shrine's sudden change in management, but as long as they came, Reimu was happy.  
  
Reimu's job was to attract the worshipers and keep them safe. Granting their prayers and convincing them to return again, that was for Sanae to worry about.

* * *

Hours later, Reimu was watching Nitori plant the last few torii when a green, white, and blue streak crashed from the sky and landed with a solid thump barely a meter in front of her. Stumbling backward in surprise, she recovered just in time to see Sanae, standing with one arm held back and the other hand over her chest, before she shouted, “Emissary of light: Cure White!”  
  
Once her brief adrenaline rush subsided, Reimu started fixing her clothes. “What the heck is that supposed to mean?”  
  
“The outfit kind of reminds me of... um. Nevermind.” Sanae laughed sheepishly. “I thought it was pretty cool...”  
  
Reimu studied Sanae's face, and wisely decided that it was better to just not ask. “... right. Did you need something, or?”  
  
“Oh! Yeah, I did. I went up the mountain to get these printed up today. I thought you could give Nitori a stack to hand out to the kappa.”  
  
Sanae offered over a stack of flyers, and Reimu looked at the top one:  
 _THE FIRST ANNUAL HAKUREI SHRINE NEW YEAR'S EVE FESTIVAL  
The Hakurei Shrine will be holding its first annual New Year's Eve festival __this year, and all humans and youkai that would like to run a stall are invited! Spaces are limited, so if you would like to reserve one ahead of time, please apply at the Hakurei Shrine no later than_ _..._  
  
It went on and on, but Reimu could already feel her eyes glazing over. “What's this?”  
  
“We decided that we want to try a festival to boost donations for New Year's, right?”  
  
“I guess...” Really, Reimu had almost forgotten about it. It sounded like a lot of work, and that one time youkai had tried having a festival at the shrine had taken her days to clean up. But Sanae was right, they'd agreed to a festival, and it was probably a pretty good idea. “What's this, though?”  
  
“Well, if we tell people a couple of weeks ahead of time, they have time to prepare their stall. Plus, by making all the humans walk to the shrine if they want to register, maybe they'll see how nice it is now and word will spread more!”  
  
“Right, right. Pretty crafty.” Further down the path, there was a clamor of buzzing blades as Nitori trimmed up another log, and Reimu had to go silent until she could hear herself think again. “I can probably pass some out to other youkai. I... know where a lot of them live.”  
  
“Um! Reimu!” Nitori was far enough away and shy enough about shouting, that her voice was barely audible, but Reimu still waved her off.  
  
Sanae looked uncertainly to the kappa before continuing the conversation. “That would be nice, yeah. If this is our first festival, let's make it a big hit!”  
  
“Um, hey, Reimu!”  
  
“Yes, Nitori, that's a good spot!” Reimu grumbled. “Do you think we should invite the tengu? I know that they've kind of got a thing going with the Moriya shrine, so I don't know if it would end well.”  
  
“Hmm. Let's do it.” Sanae grinned viciously. “Let's get everybody in Gensokyo to come, and make it so the Moriya shrine doesn't get a single yen!”  
  
“I don't know about that, but okay, let's invite them. I'll—“  
  
“REIMU, IT'S DONE!”  
  
Nitori finally got both of their attention _that_ time, and Reimu turned her gaze back down the path. She was right: The last torii stood behind the weird machine, barely meters out of the forest and overlooking the human village. Nitori had even remembered to do it the way they'd discussed: Twice the height of the others, easily taller than most of the buildings in the human village. It would definitely be impossible to miss, especially at night, when the two lanterns dangling from it were lit.

Nothing left to do but see if it worked.

* * *

Even days after the trail of torii was finished, Reimu couldn't relax. Somehow, she was still as busy as ever. Today had been a long day of processing stall applications, dealing with visitors—not only had the number of human visitors increased, but somehow word had trickled out to youkai—and meeting with representatives from some kappa trade association who were upset that Nitori's work hadn't been processed through the proper channels.  
  
Running the shrine was starting to feel like _work_. It felt like it had been longer than a month since the days when her only worries had been keeping the shrine well-swept and scraping together enough donations to eat next week. Not... in a bad way. Reimu felt like the things she was doing were important. It was work, but Reimu was proud of it.  
  
Maybe Kanako had been right—maybe she and Sanae really were growing up.  
  
Now, though, the day's work was done, and the flow of visitors had stopped once the sun set. Reimu was sitting on the steps of the shrine and drinking her last cup of tea for the day. In front of her, the new torii stretched away into the forest—thanks to their lanterns, she could see them even in the dark, a glowing line connecting the two.  
  
Figuring out how to keep the lanterns lit had been a challenge by itself. At first, Sanae had snuck down to the geyser center, which was warm enough to attract fire fairies. Convincing a few to come up and keep the lanterns lit easily enough... but keeping the fairies from lighting everything else on fire wasn't, and Reimu had ultimately driven them off. After that, she'd managed to find a lantern tsukumogami who seemed happy enough to take care of it.  
  
This was what the new Gensokyo looked like, right? Humans and youkai living in peace? When Reimu was young, the two had barely interacted, but now there was an entire temple full of youkai practically in the village. She had to admit, it made _her_ job easier.  
  
The door into the shrine slid open behind her. She didn't exactly need to turn around to know who was behind her. “Good evening, Sanae.”  
  
“Hiya. Do you have any plans for the evening?”  
  
“Um, no?” It wasn't like Reimu ever did anything in the evenings other than sweep, drink tea, or nap. She started to turn around, but before she could, something dropped in her lap. The toy—er, the Famicom light gun. Whatever it was. She studied it for a second, then tilted her head to look up to look to Sanae, who was now leaning over her. “What's this for?”  
  
“I was thinking! Now that I've gotten more faith, it should be safe for you to use your powers some more.”  
  
“Oh.”  
  
“You've still got to get used to fighting this way, right? You could use ofuda if you want, but you'll need this to channel power from me. _And_ , since I don't want to use power from Kanako and Suwako anymore... I need to get used to fighting again, too. So, do you want to try a friendly spell card duel?”  
  
“Neither of us really have any spell cards with our new powers yet, though...”  
  
“Well, we've got to make some sometime,” Sanae said with a smile. “But if you're too scared to take me on, I understand...”  
  
“Pfft.” Reimu wasn't about to cave to reverse psychology, even for a girl she _might_ have a crush on, but this wasn't a hard decision for her. These weeks spent flightless and defenseless had been inconvenient as hell, in more ways than one. “As long as you think you're feeling better...”  
  
“I am! Now go get your things, so I can kick your butt.”

* * *

Even with a familiar fistful of ofuda, holding the light gun felt weird to Reimu. It wasn't as heavy as her gohei was, and the dangling cord kept threatening to trip her until she tucked one end into the bow on her back. She was careful to hold it like the guns in the outside world manga that Yukari had left at the shrine once, though, as she loosened up for combat. “What do _you_ shoot now, anyway?”  
  
“I can still do wind! But I've been thinking of mixing it up a little. Remember when I blessed that restaurant?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Well, I think it worked! And, um, a lot of the other businesses found out, and that's kinda been a lot of the visitors...”  
  
“Right...”  
  
“So, a lot of people have kinda been worshiping me as a goddess of prosperity! Check _this_ out!” Sanae closed her eyes, then thrust a hand into the air. From her splayed fingertips, dozens of one yen coins shot out. Seconds later, they rained down, clattering around the courtyard.  
  
“You can...? W-we're rich!”  
  
“Haha. Pretty cool, right? They disappear after a few seconds, though.”  
  
Reimu slumped in disappointment. “Komachi's going to be jealous that you ripped her off.”  
  
“Let her. Besides, if _you've_ got such amazing ideas for original attacks, let's see 'em!”  
  
“Okay, um.” Reimu looked down to the light gun again. So she could shoot those bullets, and her ofuda. Hmm. First, time to see if the old standbys worked. But first...  
  
Reimu closed her eyes and focused on the goshintai in her hand. This time, she could feel the power flow into her more readily... and again, she could feel Sanae through the link, but formed through the goshintai, it was much more distant. She could feel her presence, but not much else. It was almost a relief. She wasn't sure if she could last an entire fight without thinking something embarrassing if she did _that_ again.  
  
Once the flow of power was stable, Reimu rocketed up a few meters off the ground, then let herself float, laughing gleefully. She hadn't realized how much she'd missed this. Across from her, Sanae drifted up to the same height, with a satisfied smirk on your face. “See? I always thought it was weird that nobody in Gensokyo just flies around for fun. I wasn't allowed flying at _all_ in the outside world. So, are you going to shoot me, or not?”  
  
Reimu nodded. The old standbys, right. She spread the ofuda in her left hand, then thrust it out. They flew forward, an arc of danmaku that sliced through the air until they disappeared into the trees at the edge of the shrine's land. “Well, at least I'm not totally helpless anymore...”  
  
“Boring. New powers! I wanna see them!”  
  
“Okay, okay...” Well, if one hand was full of cards, that left the hand holding the goshintai. Reimu raised the light gun and squinted at it, but was surprised at how easy it was to channel energy into it, like an extension of her body. It only took a second or two of concentration before a little bullet-shaped burst of energy coalesced at the tip of the barrel, then blasted out and impacted into the ground.  
  
Reimu might have been a bit ignorant of some of her duties, but she _had_ been the one to introduce the spell card system, and she liked to think that she was damn good at it. Marisa... was probably a bit better at theorycrafting, but Reimu would run ideas past her later. For now, she thought about the straightforward changes that this would mean. She could still pull off most of her regular spellcards, although she'd have to tweak the ones that had used the yin-yang orb. And firing different projects from each hand gave her some interesting possibilities...  
  
With her hands outstretched, Reimu fanned them in front of her. Two arcs, one of ofuda and the other of bullets, shot out in overlapping waves. Sanae had obviously not been expecting something that almost looked like an actual attack, and didn't think to respond until the projectiles were nearly to her. As she weaved through the thickest area of the attack, Reimu raised the goshintai and drew forth enough energy for a larger blast. The second that Sanae emerged from the cloud of bullets, she found herself facing a blast of energy the size of a beachball, and only barely managed to twist around it.  
  
“Hehe, so, you're finally awake, huh? Well, try...” Sanae raised her hands in the air, and more coins materialized in the air, floating in concentric rings around her. “This!” With a gesture from one hand, half of the coins exploded outward. Not bad for a warmup attack, but Reimu had seen worse. She made a point of dodging only when she had to, almost lazily weaving between them just to taunt Sanae, only to be caught by surprise when Sanae thrust her other hand forward and released the rest of the coins in a much thicker, conical blast, targeted right at Reimu.  
  
That was more like it. As she dived into a dense blast of danmaku, the familiar adrenaline rush of combat sent Reimu's pulse beating in her ears.  
  
She had to admit, she'd missed this.

* * *

The practice barely lasted fifteen minutes before Sanae had to call an end to it, but Reimu was feeling refreshed when the two descended back to the ground. She'd need some more practice before she could start putting together spell cards based on her new powers, but it had been a good start. Now that she had an idea of what she was capable of, she could put some ideas together to try next time.  
  
The only cause for concern was Sanae, who looked a bit winded as she settled down to sit on the shrine's steps. Reimu did her best to subtly inspect the girl, but no—she looked tired, but not drawn-out and haggard like she had after the fight in the village. Still, it was better to be safe. “How do you feel? We didn't do too much, did we?”  
  
Sanae dismissed the questions with a wave of her hand. “Ahh, no, I'm good! That was nothing. I'm sorry I'm holding you back.”  
  
“You can only gain faith so fast.”  
  
“I guess.”  
  
“Do you... need some water or anything?” Attending to somebody else's needs didn't come naturally to Reimu, but she'd been doing her best lately. According to Yukari's definition, it probably counted as worship, but more importantly, it made her feel good to do these little favors for Sanae.  
  
Of course, the downside to that was that just making the offer raised a blush to her cheeks, but she hoped that Sanae couldn't notice in the dim lighting. If she did, she didn't give much indication of it; her only response was, “Sure,” as she leaned back on her elbows and got comfortable.  
  
When Reimu returned with the glass of water, Sanae was staring out into the forest, toward the human village. She barely even seemed to notice as Reimu sat it down and then took a seat next to her. This late in the year, it was a bit chillier at night than Reimu would like if she was going to be sitting outside, but it could have been worse. And with Sanae sitting next to her...  
  
Reimu was briefly tempted to scoot in close and use 'staying warm' as an excuse for wrapping an arm around Sanae, but no. That seemed like the sort of thing Marisa would love, which meant it was probably an inherently bad idea.  
  
Before Reimu could fish up a suitable conversation topic, Sanae surprised her by breaking the silence. “Hey, um, Reimu?”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“I'm not... bothering you, am I? By living here?”  
  
“Huh?” The question was unexpected enough that Reimu had to go silent for a few seconds as she struggled to put together an answer. “No. I'm the one who asked you to come here, remember?”  
  
“Hehe. Yeah, I guess. I just realized that this has all been a lot of change for you...” Sanae's gaze settled onto the path of lit torii. “A shrine might exist for the purpose of its kami, but I know this is your home.”  
  
“It's fine. I'm actually kind of enjoying it. It's more fun when other people care about the shrine, I think.”  
  
“Good! I wasn't kidding about making this into the best shrine in Gensokyo.”  
  
Sanae shot Reimu a lopsided grin, and Reimu practically reeled. There was that enthusiasm again. Aagh. As effective as if Sanae had physically reached into her chest and tickled her heart. She could feel a need to say _something_ , anything, swelling within her, and she decided to cut it off by sticking to a safe conversation topic.”Um. The stars are pretty tonight.” … Reimu immediately wanted to take it back and pick something less stereotypically romantic, but the words were out of her mouth and her fate was sealed.  
  
“Hmm?” Sanae, fortunately, seemed to be deep in thought, herself, and only slowly turned her eyes up. Reimu had chosen the conversation topic almost at random, but she wasn't wrong: It was late enough that the stars were out, and clear enough that they were mostly visible. Sanae smiled up at them. “Yeah, they are, huh? We couldn't really see them much in the outside world. Too much light pollution.”  
  
Reimu nodded, and the conversation died a premature death. She didn't trust herself to say anything else. Besides, sitting like this—no sound except for a slight breeze rustling the trees, the only lights in the darkness the stars overhead and the trail of lanterns leading off into the forest, and Sanae sitting so close that she could almost hear her heartbeat—it was nice. She could sit like this for an hour and just appreciate the little subtle differences in every moment.  
  
Not that Reimu got the chance. Sanae finished off her water and stretched. “Well... I guess I should get to bed, huh? It will be time to start setting up the stalls soon, so we should rest up while we have the chance!”  
  
“Huh? Oh, yeah. I should do that too.”  
  
Before Reimu knew what was happening, Sanae was pressed to her side, with her arms wrapped around Reimu in a loose hug. “Well then, good night.”  
  
Reimu froze. It was just a hug, she told herself. Probably the sort of thing that happened all the time in the outside world. Even so, it took a monumental effort to keep her voice stable as she responded, “G-good night.”  
  
Even in the darkness, Reimu could see Sanae smile. She desperately hoped that her face was more well-hidden, because she was certain that it was carrying a deep blush despite her best efforts. Thankfully, Sanae pulled back from the hug after lingering in it only briefly. As the living kami walked back into the shrine, the Hakurei miko was left sitting on the steps, wondering what in the hell she was going to do with herself.


	7. The Festival/(Literal and Metaphorical) Fireworks

The first stall owners arrived barely after sunrise on the day of the festival. Before long, the clearing in front of the shrine was filled with a bustling crowd of them, a dozen humans and youkai scrambling to set up well ahead of the event. Reimu and Sanae both hurried through the crowd, trying to keep the peace and keep everybody in the spots that Sanae had meticulously assigned them on a chart.  
  
Reimu had a copy of this chart. She still wasn't sure if the whole thing was a good idea. Under a diagram of the clearing, with all of the spots numbered, Sanae had listed the stall owners. Written alongside seven applicants from the human village, there were:  
  
Stall 4: MYSTIA LORELEI – grilled lamprey  
Stall 7: KOGASA TATARA – umbrella adoption (?)  
Stall 8: TEWI INABA – color rabbits (????)  
Stall 9: HINA KAGIYAMA – Nagashi-bina dolls  
Stall 12: NITORI KAWASHIRO – Gadgets (??)  
  
As far as youkai went, there were definitely worse-behaved ones out there. Still, she caught the humans casting them wary looks as everybody set up, and the afternoon kept Reimu busy making the rounds, making sure the youkai knew that they were being watched and keeping the tension low. On top of this, she needed to string lanterns between the tops of the stalls as they were set up, make last-minute adjustments to the fireworks display she'd arranged with Marisa, and get Raiko and the Tsukumo sisters positioned to perform. Sanae was in an equally busy situation: helping with stall setup for the latecomers, getting the Prismrivers set up on the _other_ side of the clearing, and making a quick flyover of the path to make sure that all of the lanterns along the way were still lit.  
  
Before Reimu knew it, it was the evening, she hadn't had time to say more than three words to Sanae since the morning, and the first festival attendees started to arrive.

* * *

Reimu was pleased to see that the festival had gotten attendees. While most of the shrine's visitors over the past few weeks had been humans, there were almost as many youkai faces in the crowd—the youkai of Gensokyo never, ever turned down a chance to celebrate. Practically every stall with food was selling alcohol of some form, so Reimu was certain that even if the shrine didn't get rich tonight, some of the vendors certainly would. Apparently Sanae's 'goddess of prosperity' thing had somehow caught on among them, because every time Reimu saw the green-haired girl, she was being tugged toward along by one stall owner or another.  
  
The start of the festival didn't mark the end of Reimu's work, though. With the arrival of so many youkai attendees, her job was closer to babysitter than manager. Still, as the event approached its climax, Reimu finally got a chance to sit down on the steps and catch her breath.  
  
Things seemed to be going well, she had to admit. The worst she'd had to handle was steering the Eientei entourage away from Mokou and breaking up a fairy fistfight in the middle of one of the corridors. Other than that, there was a surprising peace between the human and youkai attendees. An old man from the village had even brought a taiko drum and joined in the performance alongside Raiko, making the two threaten to drown out the Prismrivers. Already, a line of people was forming in front of the donation box, ready to pray the moment the next year began. There were even a few youkai among them.  
  
Reimu could scarcely believe it. All those years that humans had avoided her shrine for being a 'youkai shrine,' and there they were, fishing for goldfish and getting drunk side by side. Maybe it really was all about presentation.  
  
A pile of napkins, wrapped around a steaming hot payload, dropped into Reimu's lap, and she looked up curiously. Sanae was bent over her. “You've been working pretty hard! You haven't had time to eat since breakfast, have you?”  
  
Reimu looked down at the parcel in her lap and unwrapped it, revealing a small pile of yakitori that steamed in the cool air. Her stomach _did_ feel achingly empty, she realized. With everything else on her mind, she hadn't even noticed. “Oh! Well. Thanks.”  
  
“Hehe. A goddess has to look after her worshipers, right?” Sanae plopped down on the stair next to her, and Reimu could see that she'd gotten quite a few for herself, too.  
  
Now that she'd realized she was hungry, Reimu could barely restrain herself. Not until half of the yakitori in her lap had been stripped down to the skewers did she stop eating for long enough to glance at the line leading to the donations box. It was a dozen deep now. “... it's nearly midnight, isn't it? You should be getting ready for all those prayers...”  
  
“Yeah, I probably should, huh? I've got about ten minutes, though! Plenty of time to take care of other stuff.”  
  
“I guess.”  
  
“So! … do you want to go up to the roof and watch the fireworks?”  
  
Oh. Right. Those were supposed to be at midnight. “... sure.”  
  
The flight up to the roof was easy enough, and the two settled in at the very peak. Reimu was instantly glad they did. It was much quieter up here. Below her, she could see the dueling bands, the stalls, and the crowds drifting between them, more people than she'd seen visit the shrine in some entire months. Above her, the stars, slowly reappearing as her eyes adjusted to the dark.  
  
Reimu had taken enough of the edge off of her hunger that she was able to eat a little more slowly now, taking her time and enjoying the view of the stars. Next to her, Sanae finished eating and dropped the last skewer in her lap.  
  
And then, Sanae's hand rested on top of Reimu's.  
  
Reimu did her very best to pretend to have not noticed as she finished off the last of her yakitori.  
  
“It's almost midnight,” Sanae said.  
  
“Mmhm.”  
  
“It seems fair to let my shrine maiden have the first prayer of the new year, don't you think?”  
  
Oh. Well, that explained why Sanae had grabbed her hand, maybe. Except...—Reimu's relief was short-lived, as she remembered where her thoughts had gone the last time she'd prayed. “A-ah, I don't know about that! I can do it any time I want, so you should probably let the villagers go first...!”  
  
“Come on, this is a real honor I'm giving you, you know!”  
  
“Yeah, but I'm not—“ Before Reimu could finish that thought, the solemn, heavy tone of the Myouren temple bell sounded, loud enough to echo through the hills and valleys.  
  
That'd be midnight, then. Sanae smirked at Reimu. “You've got ten seconds to start praying, _miko_.”  
  
Reimu held Sanae's gaze defiantly, and tried subtly sliding her hand away from the green-haired girl's, but Sanae's grip was firm. “Okay, okay, fine...” She'd just have to take care to maintain her focus.  
  
Sanae released her hand, and after doing her best to ground her thoughts, Reimu gave her a seated bow, closed her eyes, and clapped. _T_ _hese new year's prayers were always pretty vapid anyway, right?_ So. Reimu thought about what to be thankful for over the last year. _The shrine's increase in_ _donations_ _, maybe. Yeah, sure,_ _I'm_ _thankful for that._  
  
“Ahh, that's boring, don't you think? You'd better hurry up, people are starting to pray below!”  
  
 _Okay, fine._ What else. She was supposed to make wishes for the coming year, right? _I... can't think of anything I should pray for that she can actually give me..._  
  
“I can hear you, you know! Just pray for whatever and let me worry about the delivery!”  
  
Reimu huffed. _In that case..._ _I_ _wish_ _for a_ _thousand donations_ _._  
  
“Come on, if you're not gonna take it seriously...”  
  
What did she have to wish for, though? _Oh! Oh. First of all: A hot spring behind the shrine._  
  
“See, stuff like that is good!”  
  
 _And..._ _a whole year with no incidents._ _And..._ _um, what else..._  
  
“Here. Maybe this will help.” Reimu had no idea what Sanae meant, until she felt her hands clasp around her own.  
  
“W-what's that supposed to do?!”  
  
“Just keep praying.”  
  
Reimu clenched her eyes closed again, but it was impossible. Her attention just kept drifting back to those hands on hers... so warm and soft. _Aaah,_ _how am I supposed to concentrate like this?!_  
  
A pair of soft lips gently pressed to Reimu's own, and her train of thought screeched to a _complete_ halt  
  
Reimu opened her eyes, and found Sanae's green pair looking back at her as she broke the quick kiss. She sat there, stunned, unable to even _begin_ to form a response to that. A strange heat built in her stomach. Below, she heard the shrine's bell ring, as another worshiper stepped up to the donation box.  
  
“... ehe.” Sanae was blushing quite brightly, herself. “I, um, heard you that other time you prayed, you know? I think you were getting to the fun parts right as I was waking up.”  
  
“O-oh. Oh.” Reimu struggled to get her brain working again, and found herself suddenly very interested in fidgeting with the end of one sleeve, anything to give her a reason to avoid Sanae's gaze. “I'm sorry that you had to hear embarrassing things like that.”  
  
“That you like holding hands and think that my smile is nice?” Sanae was smiling _now_ , and Reimu suddenly wondered if it was just some plan to tease her. If so, it was working. “I think it was cute.”  
  
“It was—?“ Nobody had called Reimu _cute_ before. Maybe Yukari or Marisa when they were in an especially taunting mood. She felt the heat rush back into her cheeks.  
  
With a thundering wave of pressure that Reimu could feel in her chest, one of Marisa's fireworks exploded overhead. Sparks blasted outward, forming blue and white stars and crackling as they fell toward Earth. In the brief flash of light, Reimu could just barely see Marisa flying past, ready to chuck another homemade firework into the sky.  
  
Sanae laughed to herself and sprawled on her back on the roof, facing the display. “When I came to Gensokyo, I asked around a lot about what it means to be a shrine maiden here. Every single person that I met told me stories about you, and I thought you were so cool...”  
  
“And then you met me and realized you were wrong?”  
  
“And then I met you and realized that you were even cooler than the stories said!” Sanae tilted her head to face Reimu. Marisa's second bomb let out a puff of smoke and a weak flash of light as it fizzled, but it was enough illumination for Reimu to see Sanae smiling over at her. “I mean. You've been living by yourself this whole time, and you fight youkai without even hesitating. You're like a real-life magical girl or something!”  
  
“I guess...” Reimu had never thought of it like that. She had no idea what a magical girl was, for one thing.  
  
“When I was doing the shrine maiden thing, youkai-hunting was pretty amazing. Like that felt like a really big adventure to me! But the whole time... I think I really just was trying to feel as cool as you. I thought that maybe if I was good enough, you'd think I was cool too.”  
  
Reimu was still reeling from the events of the past few minutes, trying to construct some narrative out of it. The kiss, this strange confession from Sanae...  
  
Above, Marisa switched from fireworks to danmaku. A dozen rainbow streams of stars spiraled out from her, then slowly started uncoiling outward to illuminate the entire area as they dwindled. _Th_ _at_ _card_ _i_ _s named Event Horizon_ , the back of Reimu's mind helpfully supplied. She'd seen it a hundred times while sparring. Below, the crowd gave a round of polite applause and cheers. A few confused fairy attendees fired back with bullets of their own, and shouts came up from started humans.  
  
She'd deal with them later. “... so what does this all mean?”  
  
“Well, you apparently think I'm cute.” Sanae slid closer until she could reach up and interlace her fingers with Reimu's own. Reimu was too stunned to resist. “And I think you're cute _and_ cool. I, um. Hehe.” Sanae trailed off, laughing nervously. “I don't even know how this kind of thing works! I never asked anybody out back home, and I don't know if you even have dates here or if it's, like, courtship. I should have researched this, huh? But maybe we could, um... be a couple?”  
  
“A... couple! Um!” A _couple_. There were things that needed to be considered. The continuation of the Hakurei bloodline. The possible appearance of impropriety. But those were intangible possibilities, and right now, the hand clasping Reimu's own was a very immediate reality. “I... think I'd like that.”  
  
Sanae nodded and leaned forward, still smiling slyly. Another kiss. Oh. Oh no. Reimu had seen a few kisses before, but she suddenly felt horribly unready. Was she supposed to hold her lips a certain way, or, or...  
  
“Oi, Reimu!” The voice, from above, made both Reimu and Sanae jerk back to sitting bolt upright. Marisa landed with a series of boot-clomps and skidded to a stop barely two meters away, then tossed a sack down between the two. It landed with a clatter, and a few makeshift bombs rolled out. “My other fireworks drew damp, so I'm not gonna be able to let 'em off without maybe some misfires. That okay with you?”  
  
Reimu realized that her breath was still caught in her throat, and she forced herself to exhale. “Can you use danmaku instead?”  
  
“Yeah, yeah, I could, but it's gonna cost ya extra! I hear that bell ringing a lot down there, though, so maybe you can afford it...?”  
  
With an apologetic dip of her head, Sanae slipped away to go attend to her worshipers. In her absence, Reimu briefly felt like her heart was going to collapse, but quickly recovered. After all, they lived together now. They'd be seeing each other again soon enough.

* * *

Under any other circumstances, Reimu would have been furious. The entire clearing in front of the shrine was a mess—all the pedestrians had trampled every inch of it into a slurry of muddy snow, it was littered with trash, and several stalls had been abandoned. At some point, fairies had broken into the shrine and tracked mud everywhere. A handful of youkai were still scattered around and sleeping. It was almost 7 AM, she'd been watching over the festival-goers until the last few drifted home at 4 AM, and apart from a two-hour nap, she hadn't gotten any sleep.  
  
And yet, it was all okay, because things were subtly different this morning. When Reimu handed Sanae her morning tea, their hands brushed against each other, and Sanae gave her the dorkiest smile she'd ever seen. When they'd sat down to drink together on the shrine's front step, she'd dared to rest her hand on Sanae's, and they'd sat without saying a word, hand in hand, as they watched the first hints of the sunrise.  
  
Even now, counting the night's donations, they sat side by side. Sanae was so close that their bodies touched now and then, and more than once, she caught the green-haired girl—kami? What did she even count as anymore?—giving her sly glances.  
  
The contents of the donations box were probably the most money that Reimu had ever seen in one place. They'd divided it down the middle and counted in silence, and the piles of coins slowly transformed into tidy stacks. There were only a few handfuls left when Reimu realized that somebody was walking up the path toward the shrine.  
  
It was Kanako and Suwako. Even when Reimu turned her eyes toward the two, they seemed to be in no rush, and not until they were only a few meters away did Suwako charge toward Sanae. “Happy new year!”  
  
“Happy new year, La—er, Suwako,” Sanae replied, with a bit of an 'oof' as she was tackled.  
  
“Happy new year,” Kanako repeated. She tossed a small sack to the floor next to Reimu, and it landed with a loud clatter of coins.  
  
Reimu eyed it. “What's this?”  
  
“Our donations from last night. A bit over fifteen hundred yen. I brought them in case you insisted on counting it yourself.”  
  
Reimu looked down at her own pile, then to Sanae. “I've counted about four thousand so far...”  
  
“Five thousand...” Sanae said, then grinned. “Hey, looks like we've got you old ladies beat!”  
  
“So you do,” Kanako conceded.  
  
Suwako ribbed Sanae as she pulled back from the hug. “You must have done a pretty good job of whipping that lazy shrine maiden into shape, to get all that...”  
  
“Darn right!” Sanae gave Reimu a jab in the shoulder. “Count faster, miko!”  
  
“Hai, hai...”  
  
“... she's been working really hard, though. We both have. I think we make a pretty good team!”  
  
“Yes, I can see that,” Kanako said. Reimu detected just the hint of a smirk on the goddess' face, and barely resisted the urge to scoot away from Sanae so as to not give away any secrets. “Do you mind if we stay for breakfast? We brought Eientei mochi.”  
  
“Hmph.” Sanae ran one of the piles of coins through her fingers and raised an eyebrow up at Kanako. “Don't think I'll be easy on you just because you're bribing me! You promised us electricity, you know.”  
  
“We did, didn't we? Well, I'll have to talk to the kappa about their schedule.”  
  
“Yeah, you will! And hurry it up! I've got big plans for that electricity. Electric heaters inside the shrine to keep it warm during winter, and I want a laptop so I can keep track of prayers, and walkie-talkies so Reimu and I can talk when she has to solve an incident, and...!”  
  
Sanae kept rattling on, and Reimu settled back with a sigh. This all sounded like a lot of work. With any luck, she'd be able to convince Sanae to let it wait until spring, and they could spend the rest of the winter just... relaxing. Getting comfortable with each other.  
  
But if not, she was pretty sure she could put all that work in. It was for her girlfriend, after all.


	8. Four Months Earlier/Yukari Ships It

**_Four months earlier..._**  
Seeing Yukari walk anywhere was rare, let alone with both of her shikigami. Seeing Yukari walk anywhere was rare, but some things, Yukari had learned, had to be approached with the proper decorum. And today's occasion was as serious as they got. Ran had warned Chen to behave herself, and the younger shikigami was obediently attentive. Even the fairies seemed to sense it, and gave the three a wide berth as they ascended Youkai Mountain on foot.  
  
When they arrived at the Moriya shrine, there was small talk to get out of the way. Taunting remarks to exchange with Kanako. Ran sent Chen to play outside, and Sanae was polite enough to offer to watch her when she was prompted.  
  
Altogether, twenty minutes of greetings, pleasantries, and formalities passed before Yukari and Ran were led inside the shrine and took seats across the table from the two resident goddesses. "So," Kanako said. "I admit that I didn't expect a visit from the Hakurei kami."

"Ahh, am I, now?” Yukari said, with a decided lack of reaction. “Most people these days prefer 'gap youkai.'"

"You and I both know that there's no such thing as a gap youkai."

"Very well. You young ones are always so impatient. If you're going to cut right to the point, I will too." Yukari gave a practiced sigh, and allowed herself the slightest of amused smiles. "Yes, I'm the kami of the Hakurei shrine. I've also come to propose transferring that position to Suwako's lineage."  
  
Kanako raised an eyebrow. “The position?”  
  
“The position of Hakurei kami.”

Two disbelieving stares met Yukari across the table, and after a pause for effect, she continued. "Granting prayers, fostering faith... it's all time-consuming, and these days, I have my hands full keeping Gensokyo running. I'd rather not deal with it, honestly."

"But renouncing all faith like that..." Kanako said, skeptically. "That's _suicide_."

"Is it? I am a goddess of boundaries. I am the principle that empowers the Great Hakurei Barrier." Yukari interlaced her fingers and leaned forward, elbows resting on the table. "As long as the residents of Gensokyo revere its power..."

"... then something like worship is an afterthought to you, huh?" Suwako finished. She'd materialized a frog from somewhere, and was now absently stroking its head.

"To put it succinctly, yes. I've been living like that for years. After Reimu's parents died, I removed any clues to my identity from the shrine, and left Reimu to her own devices apart from training. I've survived with very little worship for this long. Now... now, I just want to take the last step."

"Hmm, is that so?" Suwako said, holding up the wriggling frog and inspecting it. She gave Yukari a sidelong glance. “But why me?”

"Ah, I didn't say you. I propose letting Sanae be the next kami of the Hakurei shrine."

Kanako crossed her arms and scowled. "Why Sanae? What are you playing at?"

A slight gesture of Yukari's hand was all the signal that it took for Ran to address that question. She produced a scroll, and as she opened it, recited, "Of the currently unenshrined kami in Gensokyo, Sanae Kochiya has a 66.4% chance of accepting the offer, and an 83.2% chance of maintaining or improving the shrine's current status over a ten-year time frame. If the idea is proposed by Reimu and you encourage her, the numbers rise to 71% and 89.9%, which are the highest odds of success among—"

"Yes, I get the idea," Kanako said, cutting off the report with a wave of her hand. "I'm still suspicious that you chose somebody from the Moriya shrine, instead of an unattached kami."

"Well," Yukari said. "There are other factors to consider."

"Such as?"

"The position of Hakurei miko is traditionally passed down from mother to child."

"And?"

"Reimu prefers girls. And your Sanae, I believe, does not discriminate."

As a furious flush grew on Kanako's face, Yukari inclined her hand again. At that signal, Ran unfurled another scroll and explained, "In the past two centuries, 78% of adoptions within Gensokyo have been performed by stable couples. According to the results of six separate divinations, adjusted for seasonal variations, if Reimu and Sanae live together for six months, the odds of them becoming a couple are 73.1%. Projected to a year..."

“You think that they'll hook up if they live together,” Kanako said tersely.  
  
“... a 78.3% chance of a relationship forming, and a 91.9% chance of such a relationship lasting for the rest of Reimu's life, yes.”  
  
Kanako let out a long, slow sigh, and Suwako, with the frog now sitting in her lap, said, “The Hakurei kami is scary.”

"Think of it this way,” Yukari said, “If we do this, chances are very good that in twenty years, Reimu and Sanae will be married, the next Hakurei shrine maiden will be fully trained, Sanae will be a successful goddess in her own right, life in Gensokyo will continue as smoothly as possible..." She folded her hands in her lap. "... and all because we stood aside and let two young girls fall in love."

"After meticulously calculating the odds that they'd do so," Kanako added, with mounting disbelief at Yukari's audacity. She fell into contemplative silence, which was only interrupted minutes later with the sound of a loud splash from outside, followed by squeals of delight from Chen. Ran glanced worriedly toward the door.

"If we agreed to this," Kanako finally said. " _If_ we agreed. ... what would you have us do?"

"Do? Well, very little. All I would ask from you is to guide Sanae in the right direction when the time comes."

Several more minutes of quiet thought passed. “They'd make a cute couple,” Suwako commented, breaking the silence. Kanako glowered at her for this betrayal.  
  
“Another important consideration, yes,” Yukari said. Without any visible signal from her, Ran slid the two scrolls across the table, and the two rose to standing. “I understand that this is a big decision, so I'll give you some time to think on it, of course.”  
  
“How generous,” Kanako said dryly.  
  
“It's one of my many virtues. Thank you for your generosity in having us here today.” Yukari gave a polite nod of her head to the two, while Ran bowed more respectfully. “Come along, Ran. Let's collect your shikigami before she empties the lake of fish.”  
  
“My Chen would never do such a thing...”  
  
As the door closed behind the two, Suwako rubbed her nose against the frog's. “Ahh... the Hakurei kami certainly is scary.”


End file.
